


Nine Lives of Cat Sherlock

by Tigresse



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Eventual Happy Ending, Feline Sherlock, Jealousy, M/M, Romance, Science Fiction, Sherlock AU, Smut, established relationships - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-28
Updated: 2019-10-27
Packaged: 2020-05-28 11:48:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 35,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19393519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tigresse/pseuds/Tigresse
Summary: Sherlock gets a taste of his own medicine (literally) and become a feline. He has nine lives and one case.STORY COMPLETED. FINAL CHAPTER POSTED!





	1. Double dose of wrong pills

**Author's Note:**

> This is sort of a second part to one of the earliest stories I had written in this fandom. You can read this story as a standalone but it might be easier to understand and enjoy it if you read the first instalment and how the 'cat-conversion pills' came about. 
> 
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/11626647/chapters/26144046

Sherlock Holmes was bored.

He was also annoyed. Boredom always annoyed him. Annoyance always frustrated him.

After a six-month spell of good fortune, during which he had solved three critical cases given by Mycroft, two international cases given jointly by Mi6 and the CIA for which he had to travel to the States and Mexico, a long-unsolved Scotland Yard case of the Moonlight serial killer, a tricky case of a Count who was murdering his young wives and a case of national importance, which he had picked up on his own, basis clues he had found in the tube with two young men, both brainwashed students led to terrorism, _he had finally hit a dry spell_. For three weeks he had no cases, barring one given by a super-wealthy socialite that had landed Sherlock a fatter than fat fee but no satisfaction whatsoever (like really, the culprit was the _butler_ again….), he was drowning in free time.

He tinkered around with his experiments, his lab kit, his solutions and solvents, he even produced a new compound that could be useful to protect glass and make it close to bullet proof (More like bullet-resistant). If this powdery substance could coat the glass at the production stage, it left behind no traces or spots but made the ordinary sheet of glass thick as a rhino’s neck. He had even sent it to the right authorities so he could get a patent on it and it seemed likely he would……

…..Still, all he needed was a case.

“Call Mycroft,” John said as he packed his bags.

Sherlock grunted.

“I don’t speak Bhutanese Sherlock.”

“No use.”

“Why?”

“Don’t be obtuse Jawn. He is getting married next month. He had three breakdowns over it already and has taken a brief hiatus from work. Same with Lestrade…..because it seems they are marrying each other.”

“Gawd,” John made a face, “The way you talk sometimes…..”

“Right. Blame it on me, always. Even you are abandoning me.”

“Sherlock I am going to Stuttgart on an exchange program. _That’s not called abandoning you_. I did offer to take you along but you said ‘no’, remember? This is vital to my career as a general surgeon. Don’t you want me to be successful in my profession?”

Sherlock pouted, “So working on cases with me is _not_ your real profession?”

John smiled and came over to the side of the bed where Sherlock was sitting, cross legged, laptop open in front of him, two cell phones too. He kissed the top of Sherlock’s head and said, “Hey, moody blue, of course I like working on cases, but I love them because I solve them with you! I wouldn’t do it for anyone else. But both of us know it’s not my only profession. We had a pact, you might need to do some cases alone so I can work as a surgeon, a consultant, remember? Come on, give me a smile, okay fine not that kind of ghastly grin because you’re simply baring your teeth! Oh God, now you’re pouting again…..I can’t believe I am saying this but why don’t you call Jim?”

“Useless.”

“Jim is useless? Now that’s new.”

“He is not a criminal anymore.”

“He hasn’t been for a couple of years. But you guys still talk.”

“Yeah, we do talk,” Sherlock huffed out a joyless laugh, “But what do we really talk about? Math, chemistry, astrophysics, music, that’s it. They are regular topics and there isn’t any argument anymore, no more games, he doesn’t lie waiting in the flat for me and scare the shit out of me, he doesn’t pop up as the cabbie and go ‘no charge’, he does not even eat apples anymore, he’s bored of them.”

“Apples?” John was puzzled, “Now what do apples have to do with….okay, fine, just give me this one week and I’ll be back with you. I promise to take some time off, we’ll go on a holiday together, we will solve cases, I am sure something will come up by then. Just be patient.”

Sherlock sighed, “Kay.”

“Now,” John started to push the shirt off of Sherlock’s shoulders, revealing the smooth unblemished skin beneath, “Let’s see how good you are at saying goodbye to your man, in the most sexually expressive way! Private, on your hands and knees, now!”

John’s growling, sexy voice went straight to Sherlock’s groin and soon he found himself in exactly the same position his boyfriend wanted him in, on his hands and knees, arse in the air, face smothered into a pillow, a strong hand gripping his hips and another strong hand pulling his head back by the hair, a thick inhumanly long cock drilling his so deep he could feel it at the back of his throat, almost.

“JAWNNNN,” he screamed when he came, shooting all over the sheets and John’s hand as the doctor stroked him while riding him hard.

Instantly he felt John cum inside him, creaming his arse thoroughly, as the doctor continued to thrust hard into him while he rode out his climax and the aftershocks. Sherlock made a series of whining, pleased, purring sounds as he collapsed on the bed, right over his own spunk, taking John down with him. The normally mild-mannered and sweet-natured doctor was still growling like an animal, still hard within him and Sherlock cheekily clenched his arse, hard, around the thick long member. The effect it had on John was immediate and teeth sank into his shoulder as the invading muscle started to move inside him again, causing squishy sounds as he fucked Sherlock in his own spunk.

“Oh-Oh-Oh harderrr,” Sherlock encouraged. He loved being dominated in bed and John knew just how to do that to him, “Yeah-Yeah-Yeah, there, mmmmm!!!”

“Slut,” John snarled like an animal.

“Fuck me,” Sherlock raised is arse and pushed back.

“Oh fuck,” John’s hands went to Sherlock’s nipples and he began playing with them, “FUCK!”

They moved with urgency and speed, whispering dirty words to each other, kissing and pawing and clawing, until a huge orgasm engulfed both and there was complete, utter silence in the room. John stayed on top of Sherlock who was motionless on the mattress, their eyes closed, their breathing even, slowly slipping into that transient stage where they were neither awake nor asleep.

John came back to his senses with a start. Opening his eyes, the first thing he noticed was that he was lying on top of Sherlock. Quickly he moved away but as he did so, Sherlock let out a dull groan. “Hey,” John said, “Turn over, lie down properly, your arm is getting stiff.”

“Owwww!”

“Wait, wait, let me help you, yes, that’s better, right?”

“Noooo, my arm hurts, you can’t leave me alone here when I am injured.”

John grinned and smacked Sherlock’s bare rump, “Won’t work Sherlock. You are thirty-three now. You can sure handle a stiff or sore arm on your own. Okay, fine, don’t look so fierce. I’ll give you a medicine, it should help relieve pain and also loosen the muscles in that area.”

The next morning Sherlock was sleeping soundly when the alarm exploded by the bedside. John jumped up, fully awake at once, and silenced the alarm. But to his utter amusement he saw Sherlock half-awake and looking for something under the bed. Groggily the detective fished out a cricket bat and raised it, presumably to break the alarm clock. “Ouch,” John took it away from Sherlock’s hands, “Someone isn’t a morning person.”

“Lemme sleep!”

John kissed him and tucked him in with the blankets, then proceeded to get ready as quietly as possible. He moved around like a mouse, showering and shaving and dressing in complete silence. He didn’t turn on the lights, afraid of antagonizing his mate, and despite stumbling and blinking and cursing under his breath he managed pretty well. In thirty minutes he was ready, bags already placed in the living room, the cab he had called for parked downstairs by the kerb. Just as he was about to leave, he remembered he had to leave a medicine for Sherlock to take later that morning. As he fiddled with the medical kit and the additional medicine bags that were kept in the closet, everything collapsed on him and he groaned. Medicines everywhere, tablets and pills, bottles and strips, it was a mess.

“Shit,” he looked at his watch, using the button to turn on the glow-dial mode, “I am going to miss my flight.”

Somehow he put things back, picked out the medicine he wanted to give Sherlock, set that on the nightstand next to a filled glass of water (which he covered with a coaster, ever the perfectionist), kissed his partner’s slightly open mouth and rushed to pick up his bags. In barely thirty seconds he was in the cab and requesting the cabbie to speed up as much as possible. It was then that it struck him that he hadn’t properly checked which pill he had left on the nightstand but then…..it seemed like the right pill……there were no tablets or any other meds in the house which could be fatal if administered wrongly…..and Sherlock would look at the meds he was taking before he swallowed them, right?

Right!

Suddenly a call came in from a hassled colleague that he was too late for check-in and John forgot about this matter.

***

Sherlock woke up several hours later, stretching and smiling and feeling pleasantly sore and refreshed. God, he had been worked over so good he was going to feel John for three days running, with every step, every movement.

Just the way he liked it!

He reached out, by habit, for the two glasses of water that John always kept on the nightstand, covered, so he could drink them the moment he woke up thirsty. He drained one glass before he noticed the pills. His right arm still felt sore so, without a second look, he simply took the pill and swallowed it down with the second glass of water. A fresh bolt of pain in his arm made him wince and, on an impulse, he took a second pill as well.

“Hehe,” he grinned, “Doc Jawn would lecture me for hours for committing this travesty!!! Two pills instead of one.” He mimicked John’s voice ‘How many times have I told you medical science isn’t something to experiment on, especially with yourself’. Then he burst out laughing.

The day proceeded in the same way as others, Sherlock scanning John’s blog page, looking through their joint mailbox on which clients sent requests for meetings or dropped in requests for cases, and searching the repository of criminal activities that was sent by the Yard and the Mi5 every week. After several attempts he found one case worth handling since the client had written it was a matter of life and death. When he asked her to call him and she did, he was disgusted to find out that her life and death was a matter of a crystal studded Chanel dress which she suspected had been stolen by her step daughter. Sherlock had disconnected immediately and then blocked her. He didn’t want such bimbettes to ever contact him in the future.

Suddenly he saw a call coming in.

“JIMMY,” Sherlock squealed with delight. Maybe Moriarty was back! Maybe his former nemesis would gave him a case. He answered the call with less enthusiasm though, “Sherlock Holmes.”

“I am Gregory Peck.”

“Jimmy….c’mon.”

“Don’t go ‘Sherlock Holmes’ on me. Can’t you be normal for once?”

“I thought we once agreed that normal is boring?”

“Look, I am already very hassled and I don’t want to go into this time travel mode of ‘Once upon a time we used to say this’. Once upon a time I had a tiny cock and no erection, now it’s different because I have grown up and am no longer a three-year-old boy. Duh! Things change, people change, what the fuck are you on about?”

Sherlock felt a bit of concern, “You’re not all right. What happened? Killed someone?”

The result was a loud outburst of ‘I WISH I COULD’. “Okay, calm down, where are you now?” Sherlock asked, scratching his back and behind his ear, why did everything suddenly feel so itchy, “Are you in London? Can I come over to see you? Which of your houses are you in now?”

“Am in Amsterdam. Will be back tonight. I’ll come to 221B.”

For a moment Sherlock wondered if he should ask Jim to bring dinner but somehow the man’s mood didn’t quite sit well with him. Jim had a famous temper, criminal or not, and the last thing he wanted was for Jim to show up here with five different kinds of knives. “Very well then,” he said to the former mastermind-turned-businessman, “I shall wait for you. I’ll even order some takeaway, if you plan to dine here.”

Jim agreed readily and hung up, which more or less connected some dots for Sherlock. Jim loved Sebastian’s cooking and Sebastian for some odd reason had taken quite a fancy to cooking gourmet meals and baking gourmet desserts. From a hobby it had become a passion and he was such an expert today that Jim adored whatever he put on the table, so, if there was a ready agreement from Jim to dine with Sherlock at 221B, then there could be only one trigger behind it all. _Sebastian Moran_. The _colonel_ was the reason behind Jim’s distress, either by virtue of a misunderstanding, a misdeed or any threat that was directed towards them and their stable relationship.

***

Sherlock couldn’t take it anymore.

He was feeling itchy all over and had difficulty keeping his clothes on. Taking a hot shower didn’t help. Then he realized hot water only dried out the skin and applied moisturizing lotion all over. Still it didn’t help and he kept scratching himself like a rabid monkey.

He went about his usual tasks thought. By seven-thirty pm was all set for the meeting with Jim. He had ordered a nice Italian takeout, bought a bottle of fine red wine, lit candles and set the table. He had even borrowed embroidered napkins from Mrs. Hudson and the candelabra she had, in pure silver. On an impulse he had even asked the neighborhood kid Peter, who did some odd jobs for him, to bring him some fresh blooms. They now sat on the dining table, nicely packed into a long-necked crystal vase.

“Have to wear clothes, have to wear clothes,” he began to feel strangely dozy, “Must wear, clothes, must not fall asleep…..”

He hit the ground on his knees, right next to the bed. That was when he noticed the scrunched up cover of the tablets he had taken in the morning. His eyes grew big with horror! John had mistakenly put ‘those’ pills on the nightstand and he, like a prized idiot, had swallowed them without thinking or looking. “OH NOOOO,” he screamed, realizing what he had done and what was going to happen.

Nope, not going to happen, _it had happened._

Instead of ‘Oh no’ all he heard was ‘MEEEAAAOWWWWW’.


	2. An unusual case

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jim comes to 221B with a case. Unfortunately, all he meets is a fluffball feline

Sherlock panicked. _No, not again, please not again._

He looked at his hands. They were now paws. He looked at his skin. It was now covered in fur. He tried to look behind him and shake his rump, he ended up shaking his……bushy tail. He had no stubble, but whiskers. He had no chin, but jowls. His ears had traveled to the top of his head.

He knew where the mistake had occurred. He had, due to boredom, fiddled with some of his earlier experiments. At some point he had created a potion that could convert a human into a feline form and, after administering the invention on himself, he had realized the dangers and drawbacks of going against nature. He had kept the potion away, locking it up for two whole years and vowing never to touch it again, till he had played around a bit with it because he had nothing better to do. He had used one of his latest little inventions and converted the liquid/powder into colorful pills. Since he didn’t have strips to hold the pills, he had emptied some of the vitamin supplements, painkillers and paracetamol tablets from John’s kit and put these tabs there instead.

_And now he had taken one, no, he had taken two of them._

As the liquid to pill conversion happened through a process of compression, a huge potion had been compressed into the tiny pill. The after effects of two pills would keep him in feline form for…. _if his estimate was correct_ …..almost a week. There was no antidote and no way to reduce the intensity of this dosage, nor any way to reverse its effects. He had to live the cat life nonstop for a week at least, perhaps more.

Oh God, what had he done! And what a sticky pickle had it landed him into? Why didn’t he tell John? He could almost see an image of an angry, frustrated John lecturing him, saying _‘How many times have I told you not to put off telling me things that I need to know as of yesterday’._

Sherlock tried to take a cigarette to smoke it and then……whatthefuck! How was he going to smoke when he was a cat?

Then it occurred to him, _why not?_

He needed nicotine to clear his head.

He scampered to the living room, jumped up on the table, grabbed the cigarette box and tried to get one out. The problem was, it was difficult to do that without fingers. He had paws now, big, fat, furry paws. Out of sheer frustration he emptied the box and tried to pick up one, again the same problem, he couldn’t really hold it. Then another thought struck him. Where there was a will there was always a way.

He retrieved a cigarette holder someone had gifted him earlier, a useless junk he had called it then. Now it seemed like the best invention on earth. He stuffed a cigarette into the holder, grabbed the holder with both paws, then put it to his mouth. Then a horrible thought came to his mind. How about the lighter? How was he going to light the damned thing?

“I can,” he cried out and heard himself say ‘Gnnaaw’.

***

Jim Moriarty was upset. So upset that a part of him worried about his mental health. He didn’t want to go back to those dark days when he was Moriarty and not just James, a canny businessman. The taste of living the legit life while enjoying the perks of being a genius had grown on him over the last three years and he hated to be into those doldrums again. One man who had steered him out of that life was his Sebby, his Tiger, his former chief of staff and the current CEO of the group of companies he headed, Colonel Sebastian Moran. Thanks to his Sebby, he had undergone treatment, rehab, therapy and finally got rid of most of his demons.

Now those demons were back, thanks to the same Sebby.

He was so grieved, upset, jealous and jittery that he almost felt ruined. His work, his business, his impeccable suit, his well-groomed good looks, his monumental wealth and the fame he had built paled in front of the loss he was threatened with and he was struggling _‘not to lapse’_. After a long time he had felt a need to blow up a building, make a car explode, randomly choke a passerby and even worse, slash his own wrists. Probably Sherlock could help, that was his only solace on this dark, dark night. Which was why he was entering 221B, hoping to put Sherlock on this job.

As he entered the flat, he stopped with his hand on the doorknob and one foot into the doorway. He blinked and rubbed his eyes with his free hand, but the picture would not change.

A cat was sitting on Sherlock’s chair…..smoking.

The feline was smoking a cigarette.

“Holy shit,” he exclaimed, “What the fuck is that elf up to?”

Sherlock heard it and felt mighty offended. “Meaow Graaanw,” he went, snarling at Jim, as he tried to say ‘Yeah asshole, like you can say you’re shocked at something weird’. Then he looked at himself and sighed, “Mewwww”. He wanted to say ‘No, I get it, this is a bit _too_ weird’.

“Where is Sherlock?” Jim demanded, “Sherly, SHERLYYYY!”

“I am here,” Sherlock replied.

“Waaaanw,” Jim heard.

“Stop it,” he looked at the cat and threatened, “One more of those wretched sounds from you and I will skin you alive, make soft and furry bathroom slippers out of you. Oh my-my, does that offend the little kitty, is he going to turn into a tiger and……”

The word ‘Tiger’ reminded him of Sebastian and without warning Jim broke down. For days he had held on to that angst and now, when he was alone with a cat that could hardly judge him, he let his guard down completely. He couldn’t keep the sobs inside him anymore and began to cry, sitting down on Sherlock’s chair, miserable and lonely and wanting to hurt himself somehow. The more he cried, the more the tears flowed, the worse he felt and he was consumed with the need to punish himself. Wasn’t that what hurt Seb the most? When he hurt himself in order to teach Sebastian a lesson? Sniffling and sobbing, he got up and rushed to the kitchen to search for a knife.

Sherlock was so taken aback by the sudden change in Jim’s behavior and the breakdown he witnessed that he dropped the cigarette and stared at Jim in utmost astonishment. The feared criminal, who he had only seen threatening and spitting out anger, venom and sarcasm, was now bawling his eyes out like a little boy. What was more, he _actually looked like a little boy_ , a lost little boy in the big, bad world. Several experiences and John’s presence in his life had softened Sherlock’s hard edges a little and he felt genuine sadness at Jim’s condition.

Oh God, what was he doing, he was taking a knife out of the drawer. Oh Lord, he was folding up the sleeve of his shirt, exposing his wrist.

“No, not in my house, NO!”

“Meaow, Maaao, Mowwww, MO,” was what Jim heard as the feline pounced on him and literally tried to scratch his eyes out. His first instinct was to stab the cat but it was so comical that a cat was trying to save his life that he forgot the angst and felt laughter bubble up inside. Unable to keep quiet, he burst out into peals of laughter, holding his sides eventually because they hurt so much!

“Oh-Ohhhhh, so funny, what a prudish conscientious cat,” he laughed.

“Meeeawwww.”

Sherlock of course wanted to say ‘You idiot, decide whether you’re happy or sad. One moment you’re crying and the next moment you’re laughing, you lunatic!’

“Hold on,” Jim gave it a strange look, “You are really trying to save me from this?”

“Meaow.”

“You want me to drop the knife?”

“Meaowwww-owww!”

Jim grinned, wiping at his tears and sniffling again, “So be it.” He dropped the knife, picked up the cat and went back to Sherlock’s chair. Sitting down on it he put the cat on his lap and let out a huge shuddering exhale. “You know what, I am here to take Sherlock’s help. Can you believe it? I want to actually engage him……for a case. I am not sure if he would take it, maybe he would, because it’s interesting and stimulating and tricky and my whole life depends on it. He alone can stop me from becoming ‘Moriarty’ again. Much as he enjoyed those games with me, I am sure he can do without the tension and anxiety I gave him and his brother back in those days. I am sure he’d help.”

“I’ll help you Jimmy,” Sherlock said.

“Mewwwooo,” the feline went and gently rubbed its paw on Jim’s hand.

“Sweet,” Jim said distractedly, “You know, I was not a criminal by birth. I became one when I was mercilessly bullied for m brilliance by my very own classmates, chastised around the neighborhood because I refused to follow conventions, teased by people because I was clearly a queer and then physically abused by my douche bag stepdad. The saga of crime that started when I was only nine, ended when I was twenty-nine, two decades later, all thanks to the man who was my right-hand at everything. Sebastian.”

“And here I thought you liked him for his big endowment,” Sherlock grumbled. “Meow meow meow meow meow!”

“Yeah, yeah, I shall continue. Why are you so impatient huh? Got to attend a concert eh?” Then he chucked, patted Sherlock’s back and went on, “Loved him so much that I actually agreed to cooperate with Mi6, particularly with Mycroft, and surrender my contacts, my work, my illegal money and assets and actually help the government with highly confidential and classified missions. Adore this life you know, thought it was my second innings, a second chance at life, till I realized Sebastian….is having an affair.”

Sherlock hiccupped. _No, not possible_ , Sebastian _existed_ for Jim, it was a very different level of devotion he showed for the Irishman. “Meow?” He asked, meaning ‘What made you feel so?’

“Guess who he’s having an affair with?”

“No.”

‘Mow’

“Mycroft Holmes.”

***

Sherlock sat on the bed, watching Jim sleep a troubled sleep. He was down to his briefs, lying on top of the covers, curled up with a pillow clutched in his arms. He looked younger, almost vulnerable, like the young bullied boy who couldn’t wait to get back home and hide under his bed. It was hard to imagine Jim this way but now that he had heard the whole story from the Irishman, Sherlock knew exactly why Jim was so suspicious.

He was even afraid to be in Jim’s position, to be in a committed and caring relationship one moment and then finding himself shut out and betrayed the next.

Sebastian had been acting distant, cold, aloof, unattached for about a month. He had refused sex for two and half weeks, which was totally _out of character_ for him. Sex was something he _demanded_ several times a day from Jim and claimed he couldn’t control himself whenever the sexy Irishman was around him. So this abstinence was shocking! Every night, after Jim slept, he slipped out and talked to someone over the phone. Soon Jim had begun to notice his absence and started to pretend to be asleep, so he could overhear the conversation. He had heard words like ‘Sweetheart’ and ‘Darling’ being used. He had also traced the calls to Mycroft Holmes’ cell phone, Sherlock’s very own big brother’s phone.

For two hours Jim had been alternately inconsolable and laughing boisterously, the first signs of mood swings. His famous bipolar issue was cropping up again. Sherlock knew he needed help, now. He had somehow managed to coax Jim to eat some of the Italian, shown him where spare toothbrushes were kept and made him brush his teeth and then shown him to the bedroom. Thankfully Jim had picked up all the cues from the cat’s behavior and obediently done one thing after the other.

“If only you could talk, if only you were Sherlock. Where is that idiot, anyways?” That was what he had said, just before nodding off.

“I want to help you Jim,” Sherlock murmured.

“Mew, mew-ew, meeew, mew-eww!”

“The problem is, I am a fucking cat, I swallowed my own pill, hell that sounds so cheesy,” Sherlock sighed ruefully.

“Meow meow meow, mew mew mew,” came out of him.

“Tiger,” Jim murmured and rolled over in his sleep, folding one leg up and nearly crushing Sherlock’s tail. The feline quickly moved aside but Jim reached out in his sleep and pulled him closer. He cuddled the ball of fur in his arms and quieted again, still fully asleep.

Sherlock tried to free himself but couldn’t. He was beginning to feel tired too. After finishing all the milk in the fridge (which Jim fed him), using the toilet (took a bit of effort but he managed, while Jim was in the kitchen) and now getting held so lovingly by the former mastermind, he couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer. He began to nod off.

The first dream he had was an image of him, as a human, with cat ears and tail, being fucked senseless by a horny John.

***

Jim woke up to find himself in Sherlock’s bed, half under the covers and half out, the drapes half shut and a slice of sunlight directly shining on his face. He felt marvelously awake and totally refreshed and, since it was a beautiful sunny day outside, quite energetic and positive. The clock told him he’d slept ten hours, something he usually did over two days. No wonder he was so awesomely comfy, relaxed and happy. He turned and lay face down on the sheets, murmuring ‘I knew Sherlylocks had a surprisingly comfortable bed and bugger has even started using better sheets.’

That was when reality it him full force and he remembered events from the previous night. Hugely embarrassed and blushing like a tomato, he sat up, hoping to escape before the sleuth actually made an appearance. What was he going to say? _‘I had a chat with your cat last night!’_

Something flapped against his hand and he saw a letter right next to his pillow, folded in half, presumably left there by Sherlock. Who else would have entered the flat and the bedroom and seen him in this state of undress….. _oh God, it was all so mortifying_! Nonetheless, curiosity made him pick up the letter and read it. Yes, it was indeed from Sherlock and the letter was typed, though he could see that had been done in a hurry, flushed with typos. The paper was scrunched a bit, which made Jim wonder if Sherlock had thought of disposing it before reconsidering and leaving it next to his pillow.

_Dear Jam_

_I had sit up a recording device in my loving room before I had to go out for an urgent call from Scotland Tard last night. I heard everything. I accept your cast. I shall ensure you have either poof of your boyfriend’s infidelities or I will cleat the air and ensure yourr misunderstandings come to a bend. Go home and act as norbal as possible. Give me a week, topsa. Do remember, bending your life will not mix anything. Your victory is in ‘Staying Alive’. Am I quoting a cliched statement? Well when someone is bonk a self-destructive brat, that’s what people doooooo!!”_

_Take care, I have your hack_

_Shercock_

Jim blinked. _Shercock?_ “You were really in a hurry, huh?” He said, smiling, “Thanks Sherlock!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock made lots of typos eh? Okay, try typing with a paw and see how it works ;-)


	3. Feline Sherlock and the DI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock investigates Detective Inspector Lestrade
> 
> And uses the men's room like a human

Sherlock snarled at the pedestrians as he walked towards the tube station, cursing them for their lack of manners, their piggish behavior and the way they pushed and jostled around. One little girl pointed at him and said ‘Mom that’s such a grumpy cat’. Sherlock muttered ‘American, Brit kid would say mum’. He heard her say ‘Mom, mom, he is meowing at me, I swear, it is retaliating to what I say’.

“Brat,” Sherlock said, meowing in response, showing her his fangs and claws. He sometimes hated kids and the way they caused a nuisance, noticed too much, too noisy, too unpredictable. He didn’t see where he was going and suddenly he felt as if his head had exploded.

When he came to, he found himself lying on a bean bag, wrapped in a soft towel, inside what seemed like a control-room. There were monitors and control panels everywhere. A big built blond white woman was sitting next to him, checking on him thoroughly. Sherlock groaned, he had a terrible headache and wanted to sleep, but the woman wouldn’t let go. She continued to check on him, turning him over, lifting his paws, even pressing her ear to his chest to check his heartbeat. “Let go you broad, I am ticklish there, don’t, I am in a relationship, hey, are you listening to me, I am gay, that’s G-A-Y, gay, homosexual, a sodomite, cockaphile, ohhh-ohhhh-hohohoho, ohhhhh, hehehehehe!”

“Mew-Mew….Mewwww, mew, mow-mow-mow!”

“What a jolly little kitty you are,” she gushed when she heard the insistent meowing, stroking his fur and giving him some water, “Thank God you are okay. Gladys will adore you. I was thinking of a present for her 10th birthday, you happen to be the perfect one!!!”

Sherlock looked at the feeding bottle he was being offered and shuddered. But then he was thirsty and the water tasted good, so he drank it eagerly while the woman continued to stroke and pet him nicely. At some point he fell asleep, the empty bottle falling aside on the floor.

When he woke up he realized some hours had passed and the woman, presumably a senior employee at the tube-station, had changed into civvies. Earlier she had her uniform on and her hair severely pulled back. Now she was in a bright green dress, a brown cardigan and her blond hairs fell in soft waves around her plump face. She looked like an Italian sexy mamma. “Ginger,” she said, “Ohhh, you even responded. Gladys will be here any moment now.”

She went to the other room and a man, slender and tall and hawk nosed, knelt beside Sherlock. From his uniform Sherlock knew he was the one starting his shift as a supervisor, taking over from the other lady. “She saved you and picked you up from the platform, but for a good reason! Good luck to you Ginger, or whatever your name is, because that Gladys kid is not going to treat you well. The last four pets she had have all died. A bunch of goldfish, a canary, two tortoise, now a cat….you’d be her first cat.”

Sherlock imagined himself as the captive little clownfish ‘Nemo’ in the Pixar animated film, about to be handed over to the dentist’s niece, the bratty little girl in braces and a ‘fish-killer’. In this case Gladys seemed to be a killer of anything domesticated. Panic struck him and he meowed wildly and sprang out of the bean bag, running out of the doorway with his tail high in the air like an antenna.

He was back on the platform but it was almost deserted at that hour. He realized it was late in the night. ‘Gotta take the tube towards Greg’s house’ he muttered as he tried to crane his neck and look for the upcoming train. ‘Watch out kid, you have already lost one life.’

‘MEAOWWW” – Sherlock wailed in shock-horror when he heard the leathery voice. Turning his head to the right as he saw a fat grey cat with coral red eyes sitting under a pillar, happily munching on what looked like the remains of a hotdog. There were half-opened packets of ketchup and mustard next to it and it licked its paws and chops as it went on munching. When Sherlock’s green eyes turned towards him, the old cat smirked at Sherlock and waved a piece of bread at him, “Hungry?” When Sherlock shook his head he added, “Fair enough, I shall eat it, waste not want not!” And he threw the bread in the air and caught it in his mouth, swallowing the last bit of what seemed to be his dinner.

“What do you mean I lost one life?” Sherlock was ever ready to ask questions to broaden his knowledge and understanding, “I am alive, I am breathing.”

“All cats know this,” came the response, “You don’t?”

“No, I am hu…..I mean I don’t know, we don’t always have to know everything.”

“You’re such a naïve kid. All of us cats have nine lives. You can get killed eight times and come back from the dead. The ninth time of course, you go straight to Heaven or Hell, depending on your karma. Have you been kind or mean to your master and mistress?”

“Ehm, I don’t have a master or mistress.”

“You don’t seem to be a street or alley cat to me. You have class, panache, looks. You’re actually very handsome. How many females have you humped?”

Sherlock got fed up after a while. It was he who was supposed to ask the questions, instead the old coot was interrogating him like he was a cop and Sherlock was a criminal. Wanting to end the conversation as fast as possible, he asked, “When is the next train due? I have to be somewhere urgently.”

“Urgent?” The old cat tossed the wrapper away, “What are you, the Prime Minister? Look, there comes your train.”

“Don’t litter,” Sherlock said as the doors opened and he climbed in, “Uncle Bertie!

He had the satisfaction of watching the smartass feline’s eyes go round as saucers. He had guessed the cat’s name from the remains of a name tag which was around his neck, a very old one but still intact to a large extent. It said ‘Bert’ but didn’t have the first half. Albert? Hubert? Egbert? Oh well, the best way to address him was by the second half of his name and add an ‘ie’ to it. So Bertie!

***

Sherlock felt an incredible delight in walking on the fence-top around Greg Lestrade’s semi-detached house. The DI lived in a nice, comfy, well appointed, three-bedroom establishment spread over two floors and located in a nice, clean and newly developed neighborhood.

Sherlock knew he would go to the window, or the backdoor, or the chimney, and try to find a way in but walking around the fence felt so good he didn’t want to go in just yet. He meowed and purred as he straddled the fence, his thick fat paws making no sounds at all, his body incredibly balanced and upright, his tail curved upwards and stiff in order to maintain his full-torso balance. In his head a voice screamed ‘The fuck are you doing Sherlock. You need to go in there and investigate like now, right now.’ But he just didn’t want to let go of the opportunity of an uninterrupted moonlit fence-stroll.

Suddenly he was almost blinded by the headlights of an approaching car. Alerted to the possibility of someone arriving there, he jumped off the fence, went behind some neatly trimmed hedges and waited there. As he had half-expected, the car parked right on the driveway on Greg’s side of the house and out stepped the DI himself, looking slightly tired but still quite handsome. A typical silver fox, Sherlock thought, one day my John will also look like that! Aging like fine wine or Scotch, salt and pepper hair, the typical sexy sophisticate, he could easily see what his brother had seen in Greg.

But then…..Sebastian Moran was better looking than most men he knew. He was handsome in a silver-screen hero sort of way, the kind of man who could derail any relationship or sway the heart of any straight woman or gay man.

Greg went to the door and unlocked it, not noticing the little cat as it scuttled inside past his legs. “Huh….whoa,” he cried out, “What in the name of……”

He switched on the lights.

“A cat,” he said, looking astounded.

“Meow,” Sherlock gave him the cute look.

“Hey, where did you sneak in from?”

“Meow mew meww!”

Greg closed the door and sat down on the ground, patting Sherlock on the back. “My partner is allergic to cat fur so you can’t be here, okay? If he sees I have kept a cat, he will throw a fit and walk out on our marriage.”

Sherlock purred and rubbed himself against Greg’s feet, disgusted with the way his tail was brushing against the man’s somewhat dusty shoes. As a feline he was making many exceptions which he would never bother to do with a human. Like he would never go within a mile of a man whose shoes had that kind of……stains. Paint stains. Gregory Lestrade’s shoes had paint stains on them, splatters and smudges, as if he had been at some construction site or a place which was being freshly painted. The way the stains were, it didn’t seem anything had poured down on Greg’s shoes, nor had he put his foot on to a puddle of paint. It was the indication of small specks that usually flew out of the nozzle of a paint-gun used to spray paint surfaces. Like someone had run through such a stream of flying paint particles.

“Okay fine,” Greg picked him up, “You can stay here tonight but you can’t be here after tomorrow morning. Mike will be here for lunch, so I need to get you out of sight….anyways, are you hungry? I know I am….I shall order takeout, maybe something for you too?”

“Yes please, spaghetti with meatballs, with some olives, jalapenos, tomato sauce, cherry tomatoes, basil leaves and chili flakes thrown in,” Sherlock rattled off.

“Oh what a whole lot of meowing,” Greg laughed, “Very well kitty, I am going to order some stew, bread and an apple pie.”

“Phuaack,” Sherlock went, making a face, “I hate stews, I hate bread, I am sick and tired of pies. That’s all Mrs. Hudson makes for dessert nowadays.” As a feline he had one major problem in communicating with people around him. He didn’t talk no more. _He meowed._

Greg turned out to be a very doting, indulgent and fatherly figure. He put Sherlock on a high-chair (seriously, Sherlock noted, a high-chair, how the fuck, why does he even have one in his house when he never had kids), strapped him up, and force-fed him to the point where Sherlock was about to explode. As a side-effect, he got so drowsy that Greg had to carry him to the bedroom, where he was deposited on a makeshift bed of folded linen, cushions and towels.

The embarrassing moment came when Greg put a shoe box, filled with sand (he had got it from the garden outside), and placed it next to Sherlock’s bed. “Here Papyrus,” he said, “May I call you Papyrus?”

“No,” Sherlock objected.

“Yes, that’s your name now. Papyrus. This is your litter box. If you need to um….uh….go to the boy’s room…..this is the boy’s room for you.”

“Phnnaaww.” ‘I am not peeing in that, I am used to peeing in washrooms, proper men’s rooms you incompetent DI’.

“All right kitty cat,” Greg smiled and caressed one of his ears, then his whiskers, “Good night to you too.”

***

Greg woke up the next morning, feeling rather groggy still. He had to work till late the night before, personal work of course, and was awake long after he had put Sherlock to sleep. Mycroft was very finicky about everything and Greg had begun to get a real feel of it as their wedding date approached. For example, he had to spend two hours the night before selecting the suits for their church wedding, reception and the bachelor’s party before that. ‘Sending you a few suits to pick from’ was what Mycroft had sent on WhatsApp and what had landed in his mailbox was a collection of two thousand suits, catalogued by style, color, designer and occasion.

He yawned. Pleasing a fiancé was tough. He hoped Mycroft would be a much better husband, easier to handle.

As he stretched and got out of bed, he saw the cat’s corner empty. Papyrus was gone. Or maybe he was somewhere in the house, scratching the floor and being cute. Oh God, was he cute as a button! Greg had not revealed to anyone, not even Mycroft, but he adored felines. As a kid he had one which looked like a ball of fur. He used to call it Fluff. He had even smuggled Fluff into his backpack and taken him to school on certain days. But after winning one pet competition, he was so enamored and excited by the ‘digital camera’ he had won as the pet’s owner, that he had forgotten to keep an eye on his kitty.

Someone had stolen his fluffy Papyrus from him.

“Papyrus?” He called out, “Where are you boy?”

No answer came.

“I need to use the toilet,” Greg decided to put off the search for the cat for a while and respond to nature’s call first. Still a bit groggy, yawning and stretching to get the kinks out of his joints, he pushed the door open and walked into the bathroom.

A screech came out of him. One of shock, astonishment and complete bewilderment.

Papyrus stood on the toilet, peeing right in. Moments later he even extended a paw and flushed the toilet.

Greg shot out of the bathroom, alerting Papyrus, and rushed back into his bedroom. “Oh God, Oh God, Oh God, I am overworked, tired, exhausted, I am hallucinating, my brain is about to explode, I can’t even begin to say what I just conjured up…..my imagination…..no, Papyrus is just a cat, cats don’t pee into the commode like people and then flush……”

“Of course they do,” Sherlock said as he quickly scampered past him and sat cutely on his bunch of towels and cushions. ‘Meow maaow’ was what came out of his throat and Greg looked up, eyes wide.

“Oh….how silly of me, you were here all through and here I thought that maybe…..” he pointed in the direction of the bathroom, “I saw you peeing into the pot, standing over it like a child would and…..Oh man, what’s wrong with me?” He held his head and sat down on the bed, then moaned when a twinge in his bladder reminded him of what he was supposed to do. Quickly he went to the bathroom, looking rather relieved when he saw no ‘cat on a pot’. Moments later Sherlock heard the toilet flush and out came Greg, sighing deeply. “C’mon Papyrus, let’s get you some milk,” he said, picking Sherlock up in his arms, “Milk and bread, is that what you want? I that what my kitty cat wants?”

“Why do people think cats only like milk and why do they talk like retards to their pets?” Sherlock questioned, snarling. However, the cute meows coming out of him made Greg reconsider and soon the detective in his feline form was treated to a nice little omelet, an apple and a cup of tea with a straw. Sherlock ate and drank with relish while Greg started preparations for a nice lunch.

Sherlock wanted just a little more time in that house. This morning, before Greg had woken up, he had hacked his laptop and found out a few juicy bits of information. Apparently there was a security code protected file Greg had, something even he was not authorized to open, sent over for safekeeping by Mycroft. This was more of a personal favor being done by Greg towards his boyfriend and that had made Sherlock suspicious. He had easily unlocked it and in it was a file on ‘James’.

Mycroft had apparently taken several videos of Jim in compromising positions. Naked, having sex, grinning as he walked around an orgy, wearing only leather chaps and belt, shooting someone who couldn’t be seen on-screen. What on earth were those videos about? Why the need for them now that Jim was also legit and mostly working with Mycroft on matters of national importance! Something was not right. _He needed some more time to investigate_.

“What should I prepare Papyrus? Pot roast or bangers and mash, pot roast maybe?”

Greg’s words brought him back from a daze and he said, “Oh he will eat _anything_.”

“What a forceful meow,” Greg grinned, “Okay, I think I shall make pot roast. Let me go to the basement and bring a bottle of olive oil. Nearly run out of it, it seems.” He patted Sherlock’s head and went downstairs. Just then, _Sherlock heard a car pull up outside on the driveway_.


	4. The Reversing Sedan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock loses one feline life but manages to move to his next destination

Sherlock quickly jumped up on a counter, then on a toaster and finally on the window sill. His face twisted with annoyance. Mycroft was here already. Damn! He was not due until lunch, was he? Why was he here so early?

_Must hide, must hide, must hide, he shouldn’t see me, Greg said he’s allergic to cats, or maybe to fur, whatever, he shouldn’t see me here and throw me out._

Sherlock had mentally made a time map, one which allowed him to calculate the exact number of seconds Mycroft would need to go to the front door, ring the bell, for Greg to come upstairs and reach the door, then let him in. Thirty-seven seconds at the least and a full minute at the most. For a young feline like him, that was enough to scamper upstairs, perhaps to the attic, and hide there. Maybe he could even take Greg’s laptop with him there, _no-no_ , how would he do that? He couldn’t exactly carry a laptop up the stairs like he was human. There were some problems with being a feline after all. _Shit-shit-shit_ , more wastage of time simply hiding in the attic because big brother couldn’t wait to have lunch.

“Crap,” he cried out, squeezing out a ‘gnnaw’ from his throat instead. As he was about to run across the kitchen he heard a key turn in the backdoor, right next to the kitchen, then the doorknob turn. “Double crap,” he shrieked with a ‘gnaaw craaanw’ sound and tried to get past it but the door opened right then, hitting him on the side, and he slid across the hallway to hit the wall on the opposite side.

“A CAT,” Mycroft exclaimed, turning up his nose in disgust.

“Hello overweight brother,” Sherlock looked up at him.

“It’s meowing at me,” Mycroft said, stepping aside in horror.

“Hello Mikey-Mikey-Mikey,” Sherlock felt playful and naughty, a bit mean even, and started advancing on his brother who backed off, step by step, into the kitchen. By the time the Mi5 and Mi6 chief’s legs hit one of the chairs next to the breakfast counter, Sherlock was merely inches from him. “Greg, Greeeeeg, Minnieeee, come here, a cat, A CAT, a real cat, since when did you keep a cat?”

Greg came upstairs, holding a bottle of olive oil. “Mike, you’re early…..hey, what happened? You’re looking at poor Papyrus as if he’s some filthy beast.”

“I am allergic…..”

“A bit, yes, but it can be handled with some meds, in fact I got a…..”

“You did this on purpose, didn’t you?”

Greg blinked, “Excuse me?”

Sherlock turned towards Mycroft, “What are you yapping on about Mike? Even for you this is a bit too much. That DI is incompetent, a dodger at work, always says ‘not my job’ and ‘not my division’ and snores through the night…..other than that he’s not too bad. In fact, for your fat ass he is rather okay! Yeah!”

“Meow, meweeeww, maaao, maaaawow, mewmewmew, gnaaaw,” went Sherlock, standing right before Greg as if he were a guard dog. That posture adopted by him, along with the fact that Greg showed no indications of removing him, seemed to infuriate Mycroft who stood to his full height ( _he was two inches taller than the reasonably tall Sherlock_ ) and put his hands into his pockets. His defiant pose, Sherlock observed. He had seen his sibling do this as a teen with his parents, later with his _girlfriend_ ( _yeah, he did have a ‘beard’ once_ ) and once even with the Defense secretary. This meant only one thing, Thomas Mycroft Chad Holmes was going to fight back this time.

“You have been trying to get rid of me, I have noticed,” the elder Holmes sibling said in a tone that was accusatory.

“Oh, and here I thought it was the other way around,” Greg tossed it back at him, much to Sherlock’s delight.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“The no-sex rule before marriage, the secret meetings with that former colonel, the late night phone calls, those short disappearances when even Anthea has no idea where you are. Do you think I haven’t noticed those things at all? If you wish to call off the marriage then tell me.”

“Oh, so now somehow it’s all become _my fault_?”

“You bet!”

“If you want to end this, don’t throw the blame at me. Be man enough to say it yourself.”

“Say what, what do you mean?” Greg looked pale this time and even Sherlock felt sorry for him. _“What rubbish Mike, you won’t get another one like him,”_ he tried to reason with his brother but his intervention only served to make the situation worse. Mycroft looked at him with loathing in his eyes and spoke with fury in his voice, the sort of cold fury that was brought on by extreme rage.

“Tell that damned thing to stay out of this, it’s meowing is getting on my nerves,” Mycroft shook a finger at Sherlock, “So you want me to spell it out to you, eh? Here goes then. You want to call off the marriage, don’t you Greg?”

Like the fizz out of a soda bottle, the anger fizzled out of Greg and he suddenly looked broken. “Of course I want to call it off,” he said as he turned away from Mycroft and went over towards the window, “For years I struggled with my sexuality before coming out, I even married and went through a loveless union that ended in tears and trauma because I finally had the conviction to live my life as _‘myself’_ , all because _I fell in love with you_. Of course I wish to _call this off_. Because it was never _my_ dream, right?”

Mycroft looked a bit apprehensive, a tiny bit regretful, “Just get that cat out of the house and we should be fine.”

“No, he is going nowhere,” Greg objected vehemently, now taking this on his ego and treating Sherlock the cat as his bargaining chip, “Papyrus is staying here and if you don’t like him, I can put him up in the guest room and train him to stay away from you. But he stays here, it’s you who should go if you can’t even put up with a small kitten _for my sake_. Do you think I don’t understand what’s going on Mike? You like younger, blonder men, with blue eyes and abnormally large porn-star endowments. One day, when James Moriarty is in his elements, you shall have a bullet put in your head and I will become a widower. I can’t handle it, it’s best if we split up now.”

“Greg, please,” Mycroft sobered up, “I have my reasons for doing what I am doing and believe me they are for the greater good…..”

“Screwing another man, who happens to be the dangerous Moriarty’s partner, is for the greater good? You want me to _believe_ that?”

“I can’t reveal more than this. But be patient, you shall soon get to know.”

“Is this official work?”

“In a brief word, _‘yes’_ it is.”

Greg looked like he had warmed up to Mycroft and thawed out of his ice-cold anger at the same time. “You’re promising me one thing though,” he said as he walked closer to Mycroft who stretched out his arms for him, “You won’t sleep with anyone, even if that’s for work.”

“Never Minnie.”

“Oh Mickie…..”

Sherlock gagged at the sight of his brother getting hot and hard with one of his only ‘pals’ in London, DI Greg Lestrade, and quickly scampered out of the kitchen. He heard Greg say pleadingly ‘Papyrus over-ate at breakfast and must be feeling sick, let me check on him’, followed by Mycroft’s response in a disgusted tone, ‘That damned quadruped can take care of itself for a little while. How about we go upstairs and have some fun?’

Greg seemed a bit hesitant at first but gave in soon. He had been starved of sex for two weeks and didn’t need much cajoling.

Snorting and giggling with delight, he climbed out of one of the living room windows and raced towards Mycroft’s parked car. He had sensed this as a window of opportunity to do his work. He had data from Greg’s comp, now he needed more reinforcements from Mycroft’s and from experience he knew that his brother’s laptop was probably in a secret compartment under the seat of his black luxury Jaguar sedan. ‘Yeah, go boys and screw each other’s brains out so I can do my job in the meantime,’ Sherlock meowed with delight as he reached the car, picked the lock with one of his long claws (that’s something he loved about being a feline) and easily located the all-important laptop from his brother’s car’s backseat.

***

Sherlock had not only managed to download some information from Mycroft’s laptop but also snuck back into Greg’s house and taken out the USB device where he had stored the data from Greg’s laptop. He used the two streams of data to fire off some files to his own ID, then deleted all evidence of this communication from Mycroft’s system.

As a feline he had some problems with the keys and typing speed, hence an hour had passed by the time he was done. Suddenly, much to his disappointment, he saw Mycroft and Greg at the doorway, both having dressed again after the roll in the sack, giving each other a brief hug.

“It was good to reconnect,” Mycroft was saying to his fiancé, his usually sugary tone whenever he wanted to talk his way out of a situation, “I am glad we cleared the air. Trust me Greg, hold on for just a while longer, and the truth shall reveal itself. Anyways, sorry about this! I came here early so I’d have the entire day to spend with you but Minnie…..duty calls. I have to be at the office within an hour so…. _anyways,_ do cook that pot roast and I shall bring….um, _dessert_. We can have _dinner_ together instead of lunch.”

“Fuckity fuck fuck fuck,” Sherlock went, “More fucks and I’d be Hugh Grunt….sorry, Grant!”

_Gotta hide, gotta get outta here, gotta sneak away so he doesn’t see me._

He hid the USB stick in a bush and was hiding right behind the car, hoping that his elder brother would drive away and not spot him at all, when Mycroft started the engine and mistakenly put the vehicle in reverse. The huge sedan came rolling backward and before Sherlock could react…

_……went over him._

The last thing he heard was Greg’s yell of despair.

***

“If something happens to Papyrus, I swear the wedding is off. You ran him over. You could have just told me you didn’t like him and wanted me to send him away, I would have taken him to a cat shelter. You said I can keep him, you lied to me, you cruel insensitive bastard, you put a tyre over the poor little defenseless feline…….”

Greg Lestrade’s voice seemed to be coming from far away. Sherlock felt himself navigating the underground chambers of his mind palace, walking towards a light he saw in the distance, and Greg’s voice seemed to act like a guide that helped him move faster and with greater clarity.

Then he heard Mycroft say something apologetically, followed by Greg admonishing him for the ‘heinous act’ and then a third person started to add to that conversation. As his feline ears strained to hear what was being said, he managed to identify the owner of the voice as a veterinarian. “It’s a miracle the kitten is still alive,” the vet was saying, “Just imagine a 1000 kilogram sedan going right over this tiny little thing. But he lives, though I am pretty sure for a while we had _almost lost him_. But it’s heart is beating and I can say…..yeah, he is very much with us at the moment. However, we need to take him to the clinic and maybe he needs a surgery, a small one in fact, to correct its…….”

“Surgery? No! What are you saying? Nothing seems broken or so bad that it needs a surgery. Why does he have to be taken to the clinic?”

Sherlock was awake by then and hearing everything clearly. He was in agreement with Greg Lestrade. Why take him to the cat hospital? No fucking way was he going to go to the clinic or have a knife run over him because this stupid vet was misdiagnosing his case.

“Just see how still he is,” he veterinarian kept insisting, his voice getting louder and louder as he tried to prove his point, “He is breathing but other than that he is so quiet, so still, so motionless. It’s almost as if the poor cat is paralyzed……”

Sherlock put his claw right into the man’s side.

“YEAOW!”

“Wnnaaawww!”

“The cat actually survived???”

Mycroft was not too happy that the house cat was back from the dead but seemed relieved to have saved his impending wedding from being cancelled. Still, to make sure he was not ‘seeing’ things (seriously, how does a cat this size survive such an accident) tried to put a small hand mirror in front of Sherlock’s mouth when Greg pushed him out of the way. The vet, clearly in pain, stumbled backwards holding his side and cursing. “What a horrid, violent, spiteful, ungrateful cat this is! I was trying to help and it attacked me……don’t you train this thing? It’s like a wild jungle cat, it doesn’t deserve to be……oh-oh, it’s snarling at me, hold it back, please hold it back.”

Mycroft quickly stepped away from the couch where Sherlock was lying, nestled amidst soft cushions. The veterinarian also moved away as far as he could and looked at his torn shirt and the gash beneath, “I need to go. I have to see a doctor now. I am bleeding.”

Mycroft saw him off till the doorway and returned to the living room, still not sure how to react to the strange situation. His fiancé, someone he genuinely loved and always considered to be a practical, manly man, was cooing over the feline like a smitten teenaged girl. “Papyrus,” Greg cuddled the little animal in his arms, “I am so glad you are okay. I thought we had lost you. Oh you got a bit dirty, didn’t you?” He coolly took out Mycroft’s handkerchief from the man’s pocket and wiped Sherlock down with it, cleaning him thoroughly. Mycroft turned up his nose in disgust but said nothing, just standing by and watching his man fawn and preen over the snow white feline with big green eyes and small smatterings of grey here and there.

“Here,” Greg returned the handkerchief.

“No,” Mycroft said, “Keep it.”

“I am not asking you to take it back. I want you to clean it and bring it back to me.”

“But-But I have a meeting…..”

“You said something?”

“No, no, I was just going to wash the handkerchief.”

Sherlock was enjoying his brother’s discomfiture till his eyes fell in Greg’s wrist watch. He knew he had used up his second life in only two days and, damn, _it was his own fault_. Had he considered the possibility of Mycroft reversing by mistake and hid somewhere else, none of this would have happened. Now he had lost so many hours already, as he lay there recovering. No harm done, he could make up for lost time if he tried to be more vigilant from now onwards.

He waited a little longer until he was alone in the room and slipped out of a window, heading straight for the bush where he had hidden the USB. Once he had got it, he clipped it on to a collar Greg had made for him, from some homely items like belts, pouches and clips. It was handy and he thanked his DI friend silently as he beat a hasty retreat from there. “So sorry Lestrade,” he whispered as he headed for the bus stop, “No time to play. Work beckons me.”

_His next stop_ – Colonel Sebastian Augustus Moran’s flat on Surrey Row in the Southwark Borough, in the southeastern part of London.


	5. Fish cutlet and potatoes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cats always land on their feet but.....

“Mrs. Hudson!”

“Mycroft, am I glad to see you!”

Mycroft had had a rough day that day. From a mini-fight and a near breakup with his soon-to-be husband to the unfortunate accident of the confounded Papyrus right there on Greg’s driveway, to the even more unfortunate fact that the bloody cat _actually survived,_ to the horrid situation of the feline going missing merely hours later and now Mrs. Martha Louise Hudson from 221B calling him urgently because something seemed to be _wrong_ with ‘Sherlock’, he couldn’t think of a worse day than this in a long, long time. As she opened the door, the brief greeting was all he could manage before he started to climb the stairs. The landlady kept up right behind him, talking to him constantly.

“I haven’t seen him for three whole days…..”

“He has gone missing for two weeks before.”

“No, but this time something is off, I can say that confidently. John left in the morning yesterday, then Sherlock was locked up all day in the house and didn’t even ask for tea, then that night Moriarty pays a visit and stays overnight, the next day he’s gone and so is Sherlock, today I go searching through his flat to see if he’s left some message and I find his phone on the nightstand. He never goes anywhere without his phone.”

“He left his phone behind???” Mycroft was astounded.

“See, now even you’re worried,” Mrs. Hudson felt happy to have justified her panic.

“No, I am overjoyed, really,” Mycroft got to the flat and rushed inside, “Where is my brother’s phone? Oh there it is!!! I wanted to get my hands on this device for a long time. Now that I finally have it, I can delete those pictures which he has been blackmailing me with for one whole year. There! All deleted. Oh, there is one more, delete-delete-delete, yeah all gone. Thank God it’s over!”

“You reptile,” Mrs. Hudson lashed out, “You’re worried about some stupid pics he has on his phone but not about your missing brother???!!!”

“Oh hush,” Mycroft looked at her as if she was an insect, “All I need to do is talk to my surveillance team and they’ll tell me where that brother of mine is. In fact, if there was something fishy or dangerous, I would have been alerted already. No need to panic, yet!”

He called the team that worked on keeping an eye 24/7 on Sherlock and his neighborhood, talking to them in a soft, polished tone, while Mrs. Hudson continued to fiddle with Sherlock’s phone, wishing the detective had taken it along with him. _She also wished John Watson was here_. With the good doctor around almost all problems seemed solvable and small. In his absence even minor things became major irritants. After almost five minutes Mycroft disconnected and came over to where the old lady stood. His face was a bit flushed, his eyes a little narrowed. “All right Mrs. Hudson, you can start panicking.”

When she looked at him, wide-eyed, he added, “He was never seen leaving the 221 premises. It seems he has just disappeared.”

***

Southwark borough was like a growing child, an ungainly kid blossoming into a self-assured adult, the tags of _poor_ and _rough_ removed from the streets and neighborhoods and slowly being replaced with _‘upcoming’ ‘developing’ ‘young and arty’_ and _‘modern and energetic’_. The once dangerous and dirty streets were clean, safe, family friendly and littered with houses and apartment buildings. The street where Sebastian had his pad was called Surrey Row and the flat was a three-bedroom terrace apartment with a view of St Paul’s and Tate Modern. With a red-brick outer façade, underground parking and spacious flats with tiles bathrooms, oakwood timbre veneer flooring, fully equipped modern kitchens and expansive closet spaces, the properties were worth well over 1.5 million quid.

Yet, they were nowhere close to the class, refinement and elegance of the houses or flats Jim owned and shared with Sebastian. Those place spoke mostly of Jim with Sebastian’s preferences limited to a single or maybe two rooms. This flat was 100% Seb, as was the area.

Rough and tough, trendy and energetic, no-nonsense and contemporary, cosmopolitan and comfortably luxurious, it reflected the spirit and choices of the mighty colonel. In a way Sherlock had always admired Sebastian Moran. While Jim made him _jealous_ (he had always wanted to ‘keep’ Jim in some way in his life), Sebastian made him _envious_ (the gorgeous height, hair, eyes, voice, biceps, triceps, quadriceps, he could go on and on). After a perilous bus journey, during which he had to hide in an old man’s shopping bag and walk down five blocks because he had missed his stop, Sherlock was loath to admit that he had taken the case without thinking much. After putting in so much effort, how was he going to say ‘Oh but I made a mistake, I should have just let them split up’!

Then there was the stupid fucking conscience John had ‘inserted’ into him. That lectured him to help Jim, not to have unholy thoughts about ‘keeping’ him.

_Anyways John would chew him and spit him out if he cheated_.

He got into the flat after a dangerous ascent up a water pipe and hopping on to the terrace. It was a slightly crowded by pretty slice of terrace which Sebastian’s flat was attached to, with rows of potted plants, a set of wrought-iron chairs and a round table, a wooden park bench and a couple of clothes horses kept on one side. Sherlock felt an incredible need to defile the place, his feline instincts were telling him strongly to do so, and he lifted a hind leg and peed right into one of the pots.

“YOU LITTLE SHIT!”

An old black man with a white beard, dressed in baggy clothes with a _‘Best chef in the world’_ apron tied over it, appeared out of nowhere and grabbed him right as he had finished emptying his bladder. Sherlock tried to wriggle free but the man was surprisingly strong with an even stronger grip and he couldn’t budge no matter how hard he tried. In sheer desperation he lashed his tail, hitting the man right on the face. “Fucker,” the man swore, a bit of fur entering his eye. His hands shook and he let go of Sherlock without realizing he was holding the feline too close to the edge. Suddenly Cat Sherlock was plummeting from the ninth floor, screeching a banshee. As the ground came closer and closer, Sherlock’s eyes grew bigger and bigger, till he had an epiphany.

Cats always land on their feet.

_I can do this, I can do this, I can land on my feet and not my head, this is not going to be my third life gone for no reason!_ He forcefully positioned himself for a better, safer landing and one fine moment, as he closed his feline eyes temporarily in fear, he hit something hard and suddenly pain shot up his four paws.

He had landed.

“Oh fuck,” he rolled over, “Oh God! We have no clue about animals and how they feel. Cats land on their feet but it hurts so bad, it fucking HURTS LIKE A BITCH!”

“Meow meow meow MEOW, MEAOWWW, Meaoowwwww-owwwwww!!!”

“ _Oh man what’s this_ ,” someone spoke in a deep voice, “ _It’s raining cats now or what?_ Where the hell did you little furball crop up from? You fell from up there? What a lucky cunt you are to survive unhurt….wait, are you a girl or a boy…..I think you’re a boy, I mean a male, a male cat! All right, come here, let me see if you’re badly hurt or if you’re just being a loud drama-queen like my ‘kitten’.”

Sherlock stopped meowing. _Sebastian fucking Moran_. He had landed on the bonnet of Sebastian’s Moran’s metallic bright-green Lamborghini. The blond man was now holding him in his arms and caressing his back and tail. Sherlock had to admit, those hands were skillful and he felt aroused thinking about the same large hands and firm fingers caressing a naked Jim. Soon he began to purr with delight, which embarrassed him to no end, but he continued to do so.

Suddenly he realized what was _about to happen_ , or what could _possibly happen_. “No wait,” Sherlock said, “Don’t take me up there. You have a monster in an apron who throws animals off the terrace.” _Maow maow maow maow maow maow maow_ ……

“It’s okay, don’t sound so displeased, my flat is nice and airy,” Sebastian responded to Sherlock’s meowing, “It’s also spacious and the fridge is always stocked well. My friend and butler Rocky will whip up something nice for you. Come on, the elevator is here!”

The elevator doors opened and out rushed the same black man, wearing the silly apron and hyperventilating. “I am sorry sir, I am so sorry, I think I just threw a cat off the terrace by mistake and by now it must be……in your arms, the same cat is in your arms, um…..good!!”

Sebastian looked offended and the white-bearded man kept explaining, apologizing and defending himself throughout their journey up the floors. When the elevator doors pinged and they got out, he even offered to hold Sherlock, a.k.a. the cat, but Sebastian swiftly turned his shoulder and shielded the cat in his arms. “No-no, Sher Khan will remain with me Rocky. Why don’t you make yourself useful and draw a nice and hot bath for him, I shall bathe him with my own hands. And make something real nice for our dinner tonight, some comfort food. How about a nice juicy T-Bone steak and some pickled quail eggs on the side for me and a crumb fried fish cutlet for Sher Khan, along with some nice spicy potatoes, roasted in their jackets?”

“Meaoowww,” Sherlock went. _What he meant was ‘I agree’_.

***

“Mycroft, oh thank God you answered.”

“John, I was about to call you.”

“No, hold on, let me tell you something first,” John seemed worried, “I have been calling Sherlock since yesterday evening and the phone keeps ringing but no one answers. If that lazy sod is too lazy to get up and pick up the phone from the nightstand, then can you please head over and give him a cuff behind his ears. It’s been three days since I spoke to him last and I actually…..I miss him you know. I didn’t even get a chance to say bye to him before I left. He was sleeping….is he ok?”

“Where are you John?”

“Stuttgart. Exchange program.”

“Oh that one! It’s very critical for you, isn’t it?”

“It’s nowhere as critical as my Sherl’s wellbeing and his safety. You know how he is sometimes, in fact you know better than me. Just check out 221B and make sure he is doing well. If needed, I can come back early, I’ll cancel the program. Family comes first and Sherlock and I are as good as married.”

“Relax John, calm down, he is fine. He is assisting with a case.”

John seemed relieved but suspicious at the same time. After a brief silence he asked, “Are you sure Mycroft? Have you met him in the past two days? Can you ask him to at least call me, text me, just once.”

Mycroft was, of course, ensuring that John didn’t panic where panic was not _yet_ necessary. At first Sherlock’s disappearance had worried him but his people had scanned every corner of London, monitored all camera footage and his informers had snooped around the entire length and breadth of the British Isles. No one had seen Sherlock leave the city of London, or spotted him going off in any direction in the countryside, or even making an attempt to leave the country. He was there, somewhere, and while the search was still on, Mycroft didn’t want the good doctor to abandon something important just because his eccentric partner and flat-mate didn’t have the judiciousness to keep _someone_ informed about his whereabouts.

“Yes, he will text you soon,” he replied.

“How’s the wedding thing coming up?”

“Busy times, juggling between work and the pre-wedding duties and responsibilities. Had my place painted because Greg felt the colors were too conservative. Shopped for clothes and accessories, started sending out the invites to friends and relatives. Not yet started my vacation or planned my honeymoon, not yet gone on the _‘personal time off’_ mode. Still working because an important case needs closure. But no need to worry really. Mummy is taking care of the wedding arrangements and daddy is paying for it, so we are covered.”

“I shall be back two days before the bachelor’s party. I’ll speak to you then.”

“Of course. You take care.”

“Greg all right?”

“Um….no…..he had adopted a cat and it suddenly died….I mean it disappeared. He is rather upset about it, almost in mourning. But I suppose he will learn to live with it, he’ll be better…..”

“A cat? A CAT? As in the feline kind? The furry, whiskered, cute, four legs and the tail comes behind that kind of cat?”

“Is there any other kind?”

“Describe it. Is it ginger colored with white paws and ears and literally a kitten, an overgrown kitten, I mean a slightly bigger kitten?”

“A teenaged kitten….I mean a teenager in cat years? No, this one is a young adult, and white.”

John sighed audibly, relieved that it was not the same kitten he had once found at home, then on the road, then discovered it was none other than his eccentric genius of a lover Sherlock Holmes experimenting on himself with one of his wonder potions. “Oh thank God. For a moment I thought…..no, well, what am I thinking? It’s all right, I just had a moment, that’s all. I shall see you soon. Just ask that boyfriend of mine to send that damned text.”

Mycroft was already typing a text from Sherlock’s phone, “Yeah, will do for sure.”

After he disconnected, he almost fired off the text before he realized he would be making things too obvious if he were to send the text right away. He had to wait for a reasonable amount of time and then send it, so it looked normal and authentic and not some sort of a manipulation. While he waited, he randomly searched through his brother’s phone. All his accounts were locked, double encrypted and password protected to a level where only expert hackers could gain access, that too with a lot of effort. Damn you Sherlock, where the hell have you gone? Mycroft fiddled with the contacts, then went into the photos folder. To his surprise he saw a sub folder filled with pictures of James Moriarty.

“Oh,” he said, raising an eyebrow, “I wonder if…..”

He looked into the last dialed and received calls and lowered his brows, matching the numbers with the ones he had on his own phone, on his contact list. After he verified they were one and the same he nodded and said ‘There you are James’.

Jim had indeed called him on that very day when his brother was last seen in his flat. Then he had visited him too. Mrs. Hudson was right. Mycroft wondered if……

***

Sherlock loved John with all his heart but he was a hot blooded young male after all and seeing Sebastian’s big juicy cock dangling inches from his cat mouth was very tempting indeed. Saliva was gathering in his chops.

He stuck out his tongue, almost driven by the force of nature in an animal and tried to lick at the monstrous dick.

“Oh no, not that way, don’t so that,” Sebastian awkwardly wrapped a towel around his hips as he continued to bathe Sherlock, a.k.a. Sher Khan, “You don’t lick daddy there! I am your daddy, aren’t I? You are my cute kitty cat, my pretty kitty, once daddy had finished giving you a bath you’re gonna have a nice meal and then go straight to bed. Or would you like to stay up with daddy as he works, since he’s got a long night ahead?”

“Stay with you,” Sherlock concluded, letting out a ‘mee-aa-oo’. He wondered what Sebastian was doing here while Jim was in their Conduit Street penthouse? _What was going on?_


	6. Intervention Needed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jim's impulse control problems lead to a one-night stand with Mycroft. 
> 
> In the meantime Sherlock discovers the root of all misunderstandings.

“Boss, the bigger Holmes is here to see you.”

Jim was sitting in his home office, grumpy as a bear. When his butler announced Mycroft as a late evening guest, he looked up from his laptop. “You mean the older one, yeah! Yes, the one who’s taller, stouter and has thinning hairs, right? Good, make him comfortable Jeremiah. I’ll be right there. Ask him if he’d like to stay for dinner, offer him a drink, though it’s likely he will refuse both.”

Deep down Jim was very depressed and, in a way, he was actually glad he had some company that night, even if it was with the Holmes he detested lately, Mycroft Holmes. He had been banking much on Sherlock’s promise of sorting out the mystery of Sebastian and Mycroft’s association and he knew there were four more days to go for that, but there were still some of those difficult moments when he didn’t know if Sherlock would succeed or if his own luck would run out soon. Maybe Seb would dump him. Probably Mycroft was just taking revenge on him for some earlier ‘unsorted’ matters. Perhaps Sebastian wanted to bed someone older and more stoic and mature.

When he stepped into the den, where Mycroft was waiting and……drinking a martini (Jim’s eyes widened to the widest possible limit because this was….the stiff-upper-lip Mycroft)!!! The former criminal gaped at the ‘minor government official’ who never drank unless he was in his Bagatelle club or at a party thrown by a senior government official, a cabinet minister or some wealthy businessman. But then, Jim realized he was now a wealthy businessman, so that was why Mycroft had finally decided to choose something from his bar.

“What brings you here?”

“James.”

“Yeah, the one and only.”

“Can’t I come over to see you?”

“I told you we will only meet and talk where there is work involved.”

“Fair enough, this is a bit about work, my work at least. May I?”

“Go ahead.”

“Where is Sherlock?”

Jim rattled off, “William Sherlock Scott Holmes lives on Baker Street, 221B is the address, it’s a first floor flat and there is a café downstairs which is called……”

“James, please, this really isn’t the right time for jokes. I wanted you to know that we can’t find Sherlock anywhere. Do you know where he is? I saw he had exchanged texts and calls with you three days ago. Those were the last conversations he had with anyone. This has nothing to do with the…..um, the thing that…..the thing the two of you shared earlier, right? If there is, then let’s end the games here and let me take him back home. John’s very worried and so is Mrs. Hudson so…..”

Jim gave Mycroft a stern glance.

“In case you have not lost it completely yet, let me remind you that I am now a criminal redeemed and rehabilitated,” he sneered at the elder sibling of Sherlock Holmes, “A former mastermind who had been granted a full and official pardon and allowed to work on top-secret government files under your supervision, you don’t suppose he has the time, purpose or intention to indulge in mind games! What we shared was a long time ago and now we have steady partners……” he trailed off mid-sentence, suddenly feeling very lonely and sad. Steady partner? Sebastian was most likely cheating on him with this very man! Mycroft must be laughing inwardly at him now!

“Just worried about Sherlock. Didn’t mean to accuse you. Just checking if you know anything.”

Jim was about to start giving suggestions when it occurred to him that Sherlock was working out his case. He had hired Sherlock and to make his job easier and quicker the great detective must have either gone undercover, underground or was hiding in plain sight. If he tried, he would easily uncover several clues and hints as to where his former nemesis might be but that would hurt Jim’s very own case. He couldn’t help Mycroft, no!

“I went to his flat because he called me for dinner. But he wasn’t there when I went there. Instead I found his pet cat.”

“Cat???”

“Yeah. Or was it a neighbor’s cat? Or maybe a regular street cat or alley cat. How does it matter? Sherlock can’t turn into a cat, can he? He wasn’t there, he just left a note for me and said….um….he said he had to go somewhere for a case.”

Jim wasn’t going to show Mycroft the letter with multiple typos and funny spellings that Sherlock had left for him. Again, it would become a giveaway.

Mycroft sat down on an armchair, nursing his drink. He seemed to be in deep thought. Jim looked at his side profile. Sherlock’s elder brother was not as sexy or attractive as him but he had a different kind of charm. Cultured, sophisticated, powerful, charismatic, suited and groomed to perfection, oozing confidence, there was something quite charming about him. He took a deep breath and cleared his throat loudly to grab his attention.

“James,” Mycroft looked at him, his eyes traveling south as Jim purposefully thrust out his pelvis and stood with his legs apart, a bit too close to Mycroft, “There is something I wanted to tell you. But it’s not the time yet, I wish Sherlock was here and we could all have a chat……”

“It’s not about Sherlock then,” Jim scoffed, taking off his suit jacket to reveal his lean torso, immaculately draped in a thick cream shirt, “I always wondered if you cared about Sherlock for real. It looks like you do, but your duty and your work comes right along with that…..no less important than Sherlock, right?”

“Try to understand,” Mycroft began to explain but he was clearly losing a battle here since he didn’t sound as sure as he normally did, “The position I occupy comes with some challenges and constraints. None of us have a free hand to do anything in a free society. Freedom comes with limitations and rules, always. Even our country’s premier’s hands are tied in certain matters. Even the Queen can’t take some decisions. Similarly Mycroft Holmes also has people to answer to. What I am trying to say is this…..sometimes it’s best to wait and trust people around you. Impulse control has always been your problem, remember how we used to attend the therapy sessions together, where I acted as your role play buddy.”

“Yeah,” Jim took off his tie. He looked calm on the outside but deep inside his temper and jealousy was flaring up. _This man slept with my Sebby. He defiled my tiger. He ruined the only stable relationship I have in this world._

Mycroft, despite his stoic demeanor, deadpan expressions and forever controlled and composed voice, was not really made of stone inside. Intellectual stimulation and devilish sexiness had always his weakness and a super-clever man like Jim had aroused him more than once before. He couldn’t help but notice the bulge in Jim’s pants, the outline of his manhood showing through the well-fitted trousers and the fine material they were made of. He quickly averted his eyes, “I-I….um, I have always looked out for you….um…..ever since you decided to…..um, go legit. Believe me, I would never do anything that’s below the belt……”

“Below the belt sounds nice,” a sing-song, sassy voice came from right behind him. He heard the unmistakable sound of a belt hitting the floor, then shoes being kicked off, then a shirt landed right over his lap. His heart thudding in his chest, his erection threatening to spill in his pants, his hands shaking with the need to touch Jim and himself, he asked in the shakiest, squeakiest voice he had ever heard on himself. “What….what are you doing James?”

“Says the one who is sniffing my shirt?”

“Oh…..yes, I mean no _, no_ , I am not. Sorry.”

“What are you sorry for? For cheating on Greg?”

“I am not going to do that……”

“You already have, haven’t you? You know I know about it all, so you’re worried I have taken revenge on you by capturing Sherlock. No, I haven’t done that. Sherlock and I have ended that animosity a long time ago. Much before you even fancied me he fancied the pants off me and I deflowered him, more than once, as did he ravish me like an animal. But he has John now, so leave him out of this.”

“You-You have Colonel Moran, I-I have Greg, I am about to get m-married……”

“You think you would?” Jim came into view, standing completely naked in front of Mycroft who was still clutching the Irishman’s shirt with both hands. A sudden electric jolt went through the Mi6 chief and everything in his world just faded, his focus zooming on to the sexy, nude man offering himself to him like an ‘all you can eat’ buffet. His self-controls melted away in the heat of the moment and his manhood began to leak like a tap inside his pants. The angels flew away, the demons inside him grew much stronger, his libido completely took over and before he knew it, he had shrugged off his jacket and tie, kicked off his shoes and advanced on to Jim like a predator that had been left starving for over a week.

“Yessss,” Jim said triumphantly as Mycroft literally tore off his own clothes and grabbed him, putting a large hand over his mouth to silence him while he pushed him down on the couch.

“Shhhhh,” he growled, showing a sexier, more uncontrolled and beastly side, “Talk too much and I shall spank you till your backside is burned off.”

“You’ll burn the butt out of me?” Jim blinked, giggling. Deep down he knew he was doing something purely out of vengeance but the Englishman’s innate appeal and charm, and the dashing side of this dynamic and polished man, did make him harder than he had expected.

Mycroft tested Jim’s opening while his head slowly drifted down the Irishman’s body and a hot mouth closed around Jim’s cock. Jim bit into a cushion but couldn’t stop a cry of pleasure from slipping out. “Lube,” Mycroft asked, “We need something to…..”

“Innovate,” Jim commanded.

Mycroft took that as a challenge and grabbed Jim’s shaft, stroking it expertly while he sucked on the swollen, leaking head. He wondered what Anthea would say if she walked in on this scene. He, the most powerful man in England, one of the most feared and respected intelligence chiefs in the world, buried between the legs of a much younger man who was formerly the most dangerous man in London.

But he didn’t care. At least not for now.

“OhhhGodddd…..It’s coming,” Jim rasped out the words as his back bowed and he thrust up into Mycroft’s mouth. The next moment the Englishman’s tongue was flooded with the taste of his lover. Mycroft waited, collected it all, then spit it out on his palm.

“Here,” he said, looking flushed in the face but very happy, “Now we have lube.”

Jim silently and wickedly parted his legs.

***

The best thing Sherlock found in humans was the tendency to talk to their pets, thinking those dumb animals would never judge them. Sherlock knew he would do that too, if he didn’t have John or that skull. But Sebastian clearly had no such scruples and he of course didn’t know that the mute little feline in his bed was actually a very intelligent, super-horny Sherlock who wanted to shag him a dozen ways if only he was in his human form. The colonel, completely naked under the thin sheets, watched television as he lay in bed and stroked the fur on Sherlock’s back. He kept talking too, which helped the detective solve half the case since the points were very revealing.

“I wish I had my kitten with me here,” Sebastian rued as he watched a soppy rom-com, “He would have been laughing at me constantly for watching this shit and even getting _sentimental_ about it.”

Sherlock meowed. Yeah, anyone would, this was really _shit_. “I miss him so much you know,” Sebastian went on, “I had to stay away from him ever since Mycroft Holmes told me about the threat to his life and to the safety of the country. A rogue agent has teamed up with a North Korean assassin, enlisted the services of a Chinese drug Lord from Hong Kong, and they want to take Jim out. Jimmy has been tasked to build a drug that neutralizes the effects of a potent new narcotic these guys have come up with. Once taken over a few months, there is no way anyone can ever come off it. Jim is building an antidote….more like a vaccination, against it. They don’t want him to succeed so…….”

“So?” Sherlock’s tail was right up in the air, in anticipation. _Maaaw!_

“Forget it, why am I talking to myself. I’ll try to sleep now…..”

“No, no, no, don’t stop, tell me,” Sherlock leapt over Sebastian’s legs _. Meow meow meow meow meow!_

“It’s not a story Sher Khan,” Sebastian said sadly, “No fairy tale, this may not even have a happy ending because Jim clearly thinks I am having an affair with Mycroft. I am actually working with Mycroft, we have created a decoy Jim who is one of the operatives and…….”

“That explains the top-secret James file on Greg’s laptop,” Sherlock murmured. _Mewmewmew!_

“Fuck I am hard,” Sebastian threw off the sheets from his lower torso, the huge erect phallus jumped up and comically hit Sherlock on one of his paws. The detective squealed, letting out a shrill feline sound in the process and froze at his spot. Despite his cat form, he had human instincts and needs and he wished he was in a position to shag Sebastian on this very bed. Now all he could do was watch and have a cat-orgasm….did cats have orgasms, maybe they did. He was feeling tingly all over and certain parts of his body were heating up to the point where he felt they were on fire.

Sebastian reached out for his cell-phone, quickly pulled out a nude photo of Jim’s from his ‘photos’ folder and began to jerk off.

Poor Sherlock rolled on the bed and salivated, burned and bristled, rubbed himself and lashed his tail, as Sebastian went for not one but two quick orgasms. At first he was fairly quick, just using his hand and a bit of lube to get himself off with a huge load that could easily drown a small kitten. Sherlock watched in awe as the monster he packed down there erupted into a creamy climax. But just as cat Sherlock had assumed the colonel would drift off into a post-coital sleep, Sebastian began again, this time using his fingers to probe and play with himself. Fed up with the situation where he could watch but not touch, see but not participate, Sherlock summoned all his self-control and got off from the bed. He padded across the room and went into the closet, choosing to sleep there for the night.

As he left, he heard Sebastian’s grunts and groans increase in frequency and pitch, volume and desperation. He heard the bed creak, the headboard tap the wall incessantly, the unmistakable sounds of a man’s breathing speeding up as he approached a shattering climax. Sherlock closed his eyes and ‘watched’ the handsome colonel, smiling slightly at the fact that John had once told him Sebastian’s endowment was the _stuff of legend_ even in the _army._

_John. Jawn. His Jawn. No, he had to focus on the case and not on the blonde’s sensuality._

The last thing he heard was a cry of Jim’s name.

Then pants and moans, hitched breaths, then a few deep sighs.

A little later he heard the man’s gentle snoring and heaved a sigh of relief. Now, with the distractions out of the way, he could focus on his thoughts and make some deductions. So, Mycroft wasn’t cheating on Greg, neither was Sebastian cheating on Jim. They had chosen to leave Jim in the dark, possibly because Jim would have reacted to the news and tried to finish off those spies, assassins and rogues by himself. Greg couldn’t be consulted or even informed because he was not part of Mi6 or Mi5, it would be a breach of protocol.

Damn it! Jim’s life was in danger. Mycroft’s marriage was under threat. Sebastian was so sad. Jim was even sadder. Greg had misunderstandings deep-seated in his mind. Everything was going wrong in some way.

This situation called for the intervention of Sherlock Holmes. A plan had formed in his head already, it was waiting to be refined a bit.


	7. A Huge Mistake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock gasped. Sebastian froze. Jim cringed. A moment later Mycroft groaned, “No…damn!”

Sherlock sighed with relief, even though he was dead tired. Doing human activities as a feline had taken their own sweet time and he had been awake through the night to get the jobs done and all the evidence and notes in place. Finally, at 4 am, he was ready for a little shuteye.

His cat ears droopy, his whiskers comically droopy like those of the popular and much loved cartoon character of Thomas Cat, he got back into the bedroom when a sleepy Sebastian suddenly reached out with his long arm and grabbed him. “C’mere,” he rasped his voice gravelly with sleep, “Who told you to get out of bed?”

Cat Sherlock whined, trying to essentially say ‘How could I sleep here when you kept jerking off and I couldn’t, I don’t know how to masturbate as a cat’, but the former sniper of James Moriarty simply stroked him behind the ears and placed him right at the center of the mattress. At any other time Sherlock would have avoided the bed, especially since it still smelled of sex and male hormones, but he was so sleepy that the idea of being on those soft sheets, under those warm covers and in Sebastian’s loving embrace seemed like a good idea. He snuggled closer to the blond man who had already fallen asleep again, made a series of purring sounds and closed his eyes. Before he could even count to five he was deep into the land of the nod.

He slept well, knowing fully well that he had laid out all the necessary proofs, clues, detailed out the steps that would lead to a Sebastian-Jim reconciliation. He just wished Sebastian found them a little later in the day and not sometime around eight or nine o’ clock. After all, Sherlock needed to sleep for a while too. _Strange how I need more sleep as a cat than I used to need as a human being._

He woke to the sounds of joyful laughter and excited mumbling and hoops of delight and whined slightly, wishing he could sleep for just a while longer. But the sounds continued and then he heard some loud thumps. Cracking open one green eye, he spotted a mountain coming close to him with the sun peering out right from beyond its peak. Blue ice capped the top part and the lower slopes were thickly wooded with coniferous greens.

His vision cleared when he was swooped up in the air by a strong gust of wind…..or was it the thick branch of a tall and majestic tree?!

_No. Not the wind. Not even a branch. This was Sebastian’s muscular, Herculean arm._

He realized he had been ‘seeing things’ in his sleepy haze. The mountain he had seen was the colonel Moran, the sun was none other than his thick blond mane, the blue ice were his sparkling azure eyes and the green woods down below were his bottle green track pants.

“Meow?” He asked, meaning to say ‘What time is it’.

“My Jim deserves to know the truth,” Sebastian replied.

“Maw maw mawww?” _So you found the clues and messages, you big caveman. Still, just tell me what time it is._

“Something funny happened this morning,” Sebastian answered with a big wide grin, “Come, I’ll show you!”

He carried Sherlock outside and said, “I have a feeling Jim is behind it all. He ensured I got the message. See, one of my favorite books was lying right outside my bedroom door. It’s titled ‘Truth Concealed – Trouble Invited’. I had not revealed the truth to him, that I had been working with Mycroft and not fucking him….um, seriously, he and I are like oil and water in bed, I mean if we were to be in bed. Then I go to the bathroom and I see a message on the mirror which says ‘Better say in person than drop that text’. Yeah, right, things seem better face to face, always better. I open my mailbox and I see an email from an anonymous ID which says Jim has finished his work on the antidote and that means….that means we can tell him. He doesn’t need to focus on this work……instead he needs to be careful and guard it properly. Even for that cautionary step someone has to tell him, right?”

“Yeah, you’re not totally stupid Sebastian,” Sherlock meowed in his cat language, nodding his head in approval, “Now go and meet him, tell him about this work, while I wait for Mycroft to join you guys there and validate the points.” _End of a silly little misunderstanding. Sherlock was sure when Jim read his email he would understand the importance of reining himself in and not giving in to the urges of violence or murder upon the enemies._

“Did you just nod,” Sebastian held him up in the air, “Are you like a…..cat virtuoso, sort of a cat sorcerer or something?”

Sherlock gave him a ‘duh’ look. _What a waste of time! He should be getting ready, visit Jim, take me with him, maybe if they have makeup sex in front of me I can capture that in my mind palace, store it in a set of rooms and call it the ‘pornographic’ suite_.

Sebastian gave Sherlock some cereal and milk to have, wolfed in a bit of porridge and milk with honey and almonds added to it, showered and dressed quickly and then……put a pink bow around Sherlock’s right paw and a flowery buckle around his neck.

“What the fuck is this?” Sherlock snarled. “Graaaaanwwwwwhhhh’.

“See, he doesn’t like it Rocky,” Sebastian complained to his butler, “I told you to get him accessories, you can see my Sher Khan is a boy but you got him girlie stuff. But for now these would have to do.”

Rocky just shrugged.

“Sher Khan, you are my _‘I am sorry to have kept you in the dark darling’_ present to Jim,” Sebastian said excitedly as he walked out through the door with Sherlock in his arms, “He is my one and only kitten. He is cute and sexy and very fierce, in bed and out of it, he’s a genius, he can rule the world or just scare it into submission, he can do anything. I don’t want to lose him, especially since I know the Holmes brothers, you know, Sherlock and Mycroft, both want a piece of that arse.”

“No, no, Mike isn’t like that,” Sherlock objected with his usual set of meows.

They were in the underground parking lot soon and one of Seb’s employees was already there, with the door of the Lambo open. Sherlock was wrapped up in a very pretty but peach-colored (seriously, peachy blanket, peachy blankie, seriously!) little blanket and placed in a basket sitting on the passenger’s seat in front. Feeling awkward, Sherlock settled into the basket and the blanket, but tried to scratch the aide when he tried to put a tiny flower wreath on his head. No, he stopped at that. No flowers in his hair….fur….whatever. “It’s okay,” Sebastian laughed, “Sher Khan doesn’t wanna look like a cat. It’s fine my friend, you look gorgeous the way you are. Jim will love you. Support me when we get there, okay?”

“Okay.” _Meaow!_

“Again, you nodded like a human. You are one hell of a smart, evolved cat.”

“You have no idea Moran.” _Maww mewow!_

The car moved and Sebastian put on some lively music, whistled and sang along with it as he drove, clearly in high spirits and grinning broadly. He even saluted a traffic cop and winked at a bunch of college girls who were clearly ogling him from the sidewalk. A kid peered in while they were parked at a traffic light, exclaiming when she saw the feline. Sebastian rolled down the windows and let her touch Sherlock’s head.

“Are we there yet?” Sherlock asked grumpily. _Maaaw, waaaaw!_

“Oh yeah, I understand what you mean,” Seb said cheerfully.

“You do?” _Meow!_

“You wanna know if Jim loves me as much as I love him? Yeah, he does, he really does. You know, this Sherlock I told you about?”

“Go on.” _Mowww!_

“His partner and I were in the army together. Small little guy, not a genius by a mile, but he’s manlier and far more dependable than that detective. Once Sherlock forgot him at the train station. Yeah, he boarded a train for Birmingham and forgot John was with him. Jim and I placed a bet John will drop him like a hot potato and move out of 221B but no, he forgave Sherlock and stayed back. I guess, that’s what true love is. Guess what else true love is?”

“Do illuminate that dark corner,” Sherlock snorted. _Mee-aa-oo-ww!_

“Jim! He represents true love. I have proof, I am not just living with my head in the clouds. My James could have easily escaped from England and continued committing crimes from some other corner of the world. He could have stayed underground, anonymous, kept himself out of harm’s way and gone about his business. But he didn’t. He struck a pact with Mycroft, faked his death and Sherlock’s, then slowly gave up his web while he built on the legit part of his business. He listened to my advice, took medications and therapy, got his bipolar largely under control. He even gave up Sherlock. Those two have a thing there….had a thing there, and I would have gladly agreed to an open marriage……”

_“WHAT? He didn’t tell me that. We could have continued to…..oh well, some things are best left the way they are.”_

“You’re meowing quite loud. Are you comfortable. Oh well, there you go, you’re nodding like a person. Anyways, where was I? Yes, _Sherlock and Jim_! Jim had willingly given up Sherlock and all those casual lovers he had, just because I wasn’t so comfortable with the idea of sharing him. In fact, I want to marry him, I want to call him my husband. I have two rings, _matching ones_ , for both of us. As soon as this is sorted out and the threats are nullified, the culprits captured, I am going to propose to him.”

“Conduit Street.” _MEOWW!_

“Yeah-Yeah-Yeah, we are here. Hey, how did you know?”

“Curiosity killed the cat but if you ask me any more questions you stupidly romantic moron, I might make an exception and kill the human instead.” _A series of snarling sounds came out of his mouth as he ‘talked’._

“All right, don’t be upset,” Sebastian parked the car and got out, “I think you’re not very fond of car rides. But then, Jim likes long rides and when we go I am sure you’ll accompany us too. If you’re such a handful in the car, if you get so snarly and snappy, then Jim will just break your neck. He is still capable of doing some nasty things, you know. In our Texas farmhouse there was a lamb that somehow escaped the pen, got into the lawns of the farmhouse and ate from a large bouquet of exotic flowers Jim had been gifted. I never saw the lamb again. Guess what he said when I asked him about the lamb about two weeks later?”

Sherlock blinked. This sounded rather amusing and he was curious this time. What did Jim do, rather, how did Jim _express_ what he had done! The answer came soon enough.

“ _Sebby had a little lamb_ , then Jim _had_ it, smothered with garlic and pepper sauce.”

***

Sherlock, _even in his cat avatar_ , had his instincts right in place and always remained observant of his surroundings. In fact, as a cat he knew he was compromised in some matters and not at the best of his abilities, physically, so he stayed highly alert. Thanks to that alertness and his powers of observation, he knew the moment they stepped into ‘Fairly Towers’, that all was not well with Jim.

He first noticed it when Sebastian ran into a group of four men posted at the parking lot. They were all sitting in a van with monitors and communication equipment in it, doing their usual surveillance duty. The moment they saw Sebastian they paled, though Sebastian didn’t notice that at all and walked past the van, whistling merrily and the basket in his hands.

Then, as they reached the splendid foyer of the apartment building where Jim’s penthouse occupied the entire uppermost floor, he could _further_ sense something was off. A tall, strapping man in a suit and tie, bald but no more than forty years of age, was standing right next to the private elevator that led only to two floors of this building - Jim’s floor and the one below (where his closest aides lived). He was the chief of the team of personal bodyguards and surveillance crew who hovered around Jim 24/7 and one of his most faithful and dedicated employees. He was reading something on his phone and when Sebastian cheerfully called out to him, the man jumped so badly he dropped his phone from his hands.

Instead of picking the device up, he simply stared at Sebastian as if he had seen a ghost in broad daylight. He looked……afraid, apprehensive. _Sherlock wondered why_. Sebastian was technically the second in command and all of these people had no reason not to expect him there.

“Whoa-whoa,” Sebastian picked the phone up and handed it back to the man with a puzzled glance, “All well at home Oleg? You got a start as if you’d just seen Taliban militants with light machine guns and grenades. It’s just me, now shut that fly trap.”

“Um….sir?”

“Yes?”

“You going up, to the penthouse?”

“Yeah, straight to the seventeenth floor. I’ll stop by on the sixteenth floor later. First I have to see Jimmy.”

“Yes but he’s disabled his intercom.”

Sebastian gave the man an angry glare, “What’s wrong with you Oleg? Mr. Moriarty, a.k.a. the ‘boss’ maybe only an employer and chief to you but he’s my domestic partner. We own all the businesses together. Have you forgotten this entire building _also_ belongs to _both of us_ , the people who live on the residential floors and the ones who work on the commercial floors are tenants of both Moriarty _and_ Moran? Do I need to be announced in order to go into my _own home?_ You are completely _out of your mind_ because only under two circumstances do people speak like this, either they’re drunk or they’re hit with temporary insanity.”

“Sorry sir, but…..”

“No buts, just do your job and hold your post, I’m going upstairs,” Sebastian said sternly and pushed the button to close the door. As the doors closed, Sherlock caught a brief glimpse of the man running towards the concierge desk, presumably to make an announcement or to try and get in touch with Jim. The detective wondered, as the beautiful capsule elevator rose up the height of the majestic building, if this was actually the way he thought it was. The only reason the staff, including the security chief himself, was worried about Sebastian’s sudden and unexpected arrival was because Jim had someone else with him up there. _Oh God no, this was going to get worse, not better._

_“Maaaw…..maaaw…..graaanw……wnnaaaw!”_ Sebastian stop, don’t do this, don’t walk in there, your heart will break because you’re an idiot who happens to have killed people for a living yet cannot see his dreams killed by the only man he loves, Jim Moriarty. You’ll go berserk.

“Stop it Sher Khan,” Sebastian said crossly, “What’s got into you now?”

Too soon the elevator doors pinged and opened and they stepped out into an immaculate, spick and span marble foyer that led to an ornate and thick wooden door with a security code panel next to it. Sebastian was about to punch in the code when the door opened and three retainers appeared. Sherlock saw the same discomfort on their visages as they greeted Sebastian in a subdued manner.

“Mewmewmew,” he whined, trying to hold on to something to prevent the blond man from entering the bedroom, pillar, cabinet, drape. But it was no match for the strength of Sebastian who dragged him past all of that, muttering, “Don’t worry Jim will like ya, he does like pets?”

He opened the bedroom door. Jim had just stepped out of the bathroom wearing a shirt…. _too big for him_ , clearly not _his shirt._ “Babe,” Sebastian began excitedly, “I wanted to tell you something important. I am not having an affair. I was working with someone to protect ya…..”

Jim looked a bit stricken as Seb explained what he’d been up to and the reasons behind his mysterious behavior. Sherlock saw something move. Someone was in that bed, naked and tousled, and it was clear they’d been fucking. That man had spent the whole night there.

“What’s the matter James? You all right?”

Sherlock _gasped_. Sebastian _froze_. Jim _cringed_. A moment later Mycroft groaned, “No…damn!”


	8. Murphy's Law

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “He’s meowing at me,” Jim observed. 
> 
> “He likes you,” Sebastian said. 
> 
> “Don’t laugh at me but he reminds me of Sherlock.”

For a long time Sherlock had some theories, _only theories_ , in his head. Today they all proved to be true in some form or the other.

He had always thought Murphy’s law was just a figure of speech. Despite his involvement in solving crimes and profiling murderers, he had never ever believed in this depressing assertion that when something has to go wrong, it will.

But now, based on experience, he realized this was true. After all, things had been going wrong one after the other this week and the trend had hit its lowest point that day. First John goes off on a rare week-long engagement out of the country. Jim ends up with a misunderstanding at home and requests Sherlock’s help for the first time, only to end up meeting him in his cat form. Sherlock traps himself in his feline avatar, all due to a silly mistake in placing the wrong pills in the medicine cabinet. Then, just as all the misunderstandings were about to get cleared, Mycroft shows up in Jim’s bed, of all places, sprawled out naked and disheveled and splattered with the drying evidence of their nocturnal transgressions.

He also realized that mostly very tall and hulking men were softies inside and their emotions usually ran very high if they felt betrayed or broken. The outer strength was huge, the inner resilience almost a tiny fraction of it. Sebastian, almost of behemoth size and no doubt the bravest of the brave, broke down and dropped to his knees when he got the sudden unpleasant shock of his beloved partner’s infidelities. Tears streamed down his face and he said nothing, just kept harking at the two men.

“Sebby…..” Jim began.

“Too late,” Sherlock said.

His meowing was ignored and Jim cautiously took two or three steps towards his partner, trying to soothe him, probably even apologize, but Sebastian had clearly transcended to a plain where he neither heard Jim’s words nor saw the look of total regret and shame on his face.

“I can explain….” Jim said tentatively.

“I can too,” Mycroft had got out of bed and (thankfully for Sherlock) draped the sheets around himself to cover his modesty.

“It’s over,” Sebastian muttered.

“Tiger, what did you say?” Jim took another step in his direction, “Please Tiger, I love you very much. It’s always been you, only you.”

“You do like me too, somewhat, right?” Sherlock asked, mewing softly, then regretted even thinking that way. Now was not the time to let his ego play up. He genuinely felt bad for the former criminal duo. Being in a relationship with John had helped him understand and value relationships and he knew just how he’d feel if John walked in on him like this.

“Colonel Moran,” Mycroft tried to play the big-hearted brother, “It’s all my fault. Sherlock is missing and I came to find out if Jim had played a part in it. I have been having some issues with Greg too and then we, sort of, ended up like this. Believe me, I love Greg, I wouldn’t want to break up my established relationship with him no matter what happens…..I have nothing to gain from this, it wasn’t premeditated, believe me.”

Sherlock decided to rouse Sebastian from the strange daze he had fallen into. He reached out and stroked the blond man’s shoulder with his soft paw. That did the trick and Sebastian came back from that ‘moment’ he was having, his eyes red and his lips quivering by now. He was hyperventilating, Sherlock could clearly see that, and his large hands shook so terribly that the detective thought he was going into some kind of an epileptic fit. “Please Sebby,” Jim said, kneeling next to his partner, “I-I…..had no idea you two were doing this for me, to keep me safe, all you had to do was tell me and I would have…..understood, helped you even, I thought you were cheating on me so I wanted to….. _hurt you too_.”

_Sebastian then did something none of them were prepared for._

He stood to his full height, picked Sherlock up in his arms, and said, “I wish you both the very best. Please be happy. I am outta here.”

“NO,” Jim screeched, “SEBBY DON’T BE STUPID!”

Sebastian was already walking out as fast as his legs could carry him and he did have _long legs_ , so Jim started trailing right from the word go.

“Stop,” Sherlock said, “Don’t punish him. He’s so cute. Like a leprechaun. A cute Irish potato pie, sweet potatoes, sexy potatoes, what am I saying…..just look at him Moran, he loves you. Don’t walk out on him, protect your territory.”

Of course his words came out in a series of _‘Maaawws’ and ‘Meeaawows’_ and Sebastian totally misunderstood them. “It’s all right Sher Khan,” he said as he got into the elevators and closed the doors on Jim’s face as the former mastermind shouted and cried for him to stop, cursed and yelled at him. “I am sorry,” he said, stroking the cat’s back, “I had come here thinking you’d be his present but now…..I am sorry it has to end this way.”

“No, it doesn’t have to,” Sherlock went. _‘Meaow, mew, gnaaaw’._

“Now they will regret having done this to us.”

“Regret, how?”

“You and I, we’ll show them how it feels when one has to live with a major regret all their lives.”

As he was bundled into the car and Sebastian drove off like the wolves were on his tail, Sherlock had no idea what was coming next. But he knew pretty well it wasn’t going to be pretty or pleasant. Sebastian had taken the betrayal to heart and deep down he was not as strong or resilient as his outward persona suggested, so the detective knew he was up to no good. Something violent perhaps, if that was so then he had to stop him, feline form or not. He missed having John around, he missed 221B, he missed his happier days, he missed being a human being. Had he been human he would have knocked some sense into the blond man’s thick skull. _Didn’t you see it in his eyes, he was really apologetic about it, give the poor man a Goddamned chance._

“Where are we going?” He asked. _‘Meaw meaw meaw meaw’._

“I don’t have the will to continue, nor the strength,” Sebastian spoke in a voice so dead, so flat, Sherlock thought it was a recorded voice coming out of him.

“Don’t give up now, have a drink, clear your head, go back home.” _Mew mew-wew meow meaow mow!_

“I knew it. I knew it kitty, you won’t give up on me. You’d be with me till the very end.”

“Of course I am with you….wait what do you mean till the very end?” _Mawmawmawmawmaw!_

“We are here.”

“But this is Barts.” _Meaow!_

“This is where _all bad things come to an end_ , giving way for the new,” Sebastian explained as he parked the car and turned off the engine, “Years ago Jimmy and Sherlock played a game, fooled the world, faked their deaths, each man got what they wanted, Jim got a full pardon, immunity, much of his wealth and a respectable and legit life, he also got me. _But it seems I was not enough._ I am not powerful like Mycroft. He wants someone who can do things for him with the snap of a finger. I can’t.”

Sherlock didn’t like the look of things nor the sound of what he heard. _‘Meaw maw meow’_

“If I am not good enough,” Sebastian banged his head on the wheel, “Then I am bad, right?”

“No, no, what are you getting at?” _Meow meow!_

“All good things come to an end. All bad things too.”

Sebastian looked at Sherlock, blue eyes meeting green. Then, in a zombie like tone and manner, the former sniper said, “We’ll jump off the rooftop. Let him cry and curse himself throughout his life. I want him to miss me so terribly he’d neither live nor die, he’d neither smile nor cry. I bet Mycroft will also learn his lesson when Greg dumps him and moves on. C’mon kitty, my brave Sher Khan, let’s go!”

Sherlock shuddered, “Nooooo. I am not your brave Sher Khan. I don’t wanna die. I have a thousand more cases to solve. I have not even tried all my favorite positions in bed with my Jawn. I want to be a beekeeper when I retire. I want my mummy. I want…..why should I commit suicide huh? My heart hasn’t been broken and you’re asking me to break my neck now? No way. I just met you yesterday….as feline, why would you want me to jump off because you’re too soft to take a setback?”

A series of wails and moans and mewing escaped him and he tried to escape through the window but Sebastian stretched out a long arm and grabbed his tail, dragging him out from the driver’s side. A helpless, panicky Sherlock began to wail loudly as he tried to scratch and bite and smack Sebastian into seeing some sense but the man’s head had gone into a very bad place and he heard or felt nothing. He simply left the car door open as he tried to get into the building from a backdoor entrance. At that moment a garbage collector came out of it, knocking head-on with Sebastian and knocking Sherlock off from his arms. Scared out of his mind, Sherlock scampered across the driveway and tried to escape when…..

……BOOM.

A motorcyclist hit him and he went flying across the sidewalk and smashed his head against a pillar.

Someone shrieked, a woman cried out asking for help, the motorcyclist screeched his machine to a halt and Sebastian’s deep voice shouted out his name.

Sherlock saw everything first go blurry and then go dark around him.

***

“Sher Khan, Sher Khan, yes, he is awake, I told you he is a brave kitty.”

“I must say colonel, I didn’t believe you then, I do believe you now.”

Sherlock opened his eyes and found himself on the operation table. Molly, another doctor, two nurses, Sebastian, Jim and Mycroft were all around the table, looking anxious. As he meowed softly, a collective cheer went up around them and Sherlock was relieved to see Jim hug Sebastian and the blue-eyed man hug him back, even if he didn’t look quite the happy bunny yet. They must have spoken, reconciled somewhat, otherwise they wouldn’t have been here together. Still, it didn’t seem as if _all was well yet_ , even if the initial storm clouds seemed to have passed by then.

“Owwww,” Sherlock went when he rolled over. Damn, they had given him some shots. Some tubes were stuck into his paws and back.

Forgetting completely that he was now a cat and all he could produce by means of sounds were meows and wails and mewing and whining, Sherlock looked at Molly and began to talk like a normal human being would. “Boy, am I glad to see you Molly. Don’t give me any more meds or shots please, I don’t need them at all. You see, cats have nine lives and I think I used only four of them so far. I still have five left. Can you believe it, I died at the tube station, then outside Greg’s house, then at the driveway of Seb’s flat and now here, outside Barts, where I had faked my demise years ago. Seb was about to jump off, just keep an eye on him so he doesn’t, because he is a bit of a mutton-head…….”

“How cute,” Molly turned towards Jim, “He is trying to communicate. He’s meowing at me.”

Sherlock groaned. _Oh fuck, he had forgotten_. His entire spiel was in vain.

“No,” Jim said, “He is groaning. He seems to be in pain.”

“He’s fine, vitals stable.”

“I should take him to the vet. Only a qualified vet can assist here.”

“We saved his life, didn’t we?”

“Yeah, but that was an emergency. Now we need to look at his long-term care.”

“Sher Khan is fine,” Mycroft said, “I think what’s more important here is that we have a little chat. Come on Jim, let’s sit with Sebastian. We both have some apologizing to do towards him and we have to apologize to you too. Then I need to find Sherlock because he’s still missing.”

Sherlock frowned. “I am right here, brother mine.” _Maw meow maaw!_

“He sent emails to me, explained some things about the nature of work you and Sebby were doing. He is working on this case. He’s succeeding too. Even though he’s not here, I feel his presence somewhat, like he’s orchestrating something from behind the scenes.”

“Attaboy Jimmy,” Sherlock grinned. _Meawoww!_

“Oh, is that so?”

“Yes, it is. All right, let’s talk to Sebby.”

Sherlock tried to follow them but Molly grabbed him and strapped him to a cot that was meant for infants. To add insult to the injury, she even brought a bottle of milk and shoved the teat right into the cat’s mouth, making him drink the milk by force. “Glbgrsffjgggg….mmmnnnw,” Sherlock gurgled, grumbled and gasped, glaring at her angrily and swearing that someday he would sarcasm the hell out of her.

“You don’t seem as pleasant and easy to handle as you’re supposed to be,” she complained, “Look, you broke one of my nails and tore the side of my lab coat. I just saved your life you know! Guess what, you remind me a bit of Sherlock from a few years ago. He was exactly like you back then, ungrateful, ungracious, always critiquing, ignoring people when he didn’t have a favor to ask…..it was so hurtful.”

_“Sorry Molly,”_ Sherlock replied through a gentle ‘meoww’, fully agreeing with her assessment of him. He let her pat him on the head before he concentrated on finishing the bottle of milk. In spite of the fact that he wanted to eat a nice spicy chicken or fish and chips right now, the milk went down surprisingly smoothly. It quenched his thirst, nourished him and made him feel more energetic, much better. The aches and pains of the ‘death’ he had just suffered from also began to wane and he relaxed, hoping the conversation between his brother, Jim and Sebastian were going well. Five days had passed since he had turned into a cat and in roughly two days he would be human again. He wanted things to be sorted out by then, so he could spend a nice weekend with his John.

***

Sherlock slept for some time and woke up feeling almost normal. Not entirely to his surprise, Sebastian was by his side and so was Jim and they were holding hands. He had earlier noticed that Jim had taken off the ‘I promise you’ ring given by Seb but now the ring was back on.

_They were reconciled. Thank God!_

“Sher Khan,” Jim said as he tickled the underside of Sherlock’s belly and made him snort and snap and meow (he realized cats didn’t really laugh like humans did but they did laugh, only it was a different kind of reaction in felines where they purred and meowed in a certain manner, like he was doing right now. “Rrrrrrrrrr” he went, purring with delight as he was cuddled and kissed and passed from Sebastian to Jim and back to Sebastian like a fluffy cushion. He knew how silly it looked but then…..it felt so good too. “You happy now?” He asked Jim, “I solved the case for you, as I had promised.”

“He’s meowing at me,” Jim observed.

“He likes you,” Sebastian said.

“Don’t laugh at me but he reminds me of Sherlock.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't abandoned this story. Just took a break to finish Windsor Manor.


	9. Feline O Feline

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock gets a new name and loses one of his lives

Sherlock thought he had just won a lottery.

He was in a designer cat basket, blue and white themed, with a cat-tent in cobalt grey next to it, a premium designer litter box on the other side, a variety of toys and food within easy reach, a soft, thick rug spread out before the basket, meant for him to play in, and his very own ‘Sher Khan’ monogrammed blankie.

But that was not the reason he felt so terribly lucky. While it certainly felt nice to be pampered and he was wide-eyed most of the time as Jim made most of the things happen at the snap of a finger, he didn’t think having his ‘own corner’ in Jim and Sebastian’s bedroom was the best thing that had happened to him that year. The best thing was…..being allowed to stay right there and watch as the two good-looking men started to make out on the bed, with the clear intentions of having sex. Sherlock pretended to be asleep but watched everything discreetly as they went shirtless first, then slowly the pants also came off and the duo were as naked as they could get. “I missed you,” Jim cried out as Sebastian turned him over and began to rim him.

A happy grunt was all Sebastian gave.

“Oh yes, yes, I love that, yes!”

“Mmmmm!”

“Yeah, I can cum like this….can I cum Tiger?”

“Mmmm-hmmmm!”

Jim started to grind down on the sheets and Sherlock salivated and drooled as he watched his ex cum like a tornado, purely from being eaten out by Sebastian. He screamed loud enough to wake corpses and thrashed about so much that several things fell off the nightstand closest to him. Seb was aroused too, his huge dick was pointing right up to his chin, and his large hands kneaded and caressed Jim’s plush tushy until he was ready to go in.

Sherlock moaned in his cat’s voice as he watched that huge thing sink inch by inch into the tiny opening of Jim Moriarty _. Brave lad, not everyone can take “that dick” up their arse so easily, that too when its all stiff and full-blown hard. Credit where due!_

So Sherlock watched, smiled in his catlike manner, rolled over on the rug and observed the two mates from all angles, absorbing every movement, every tiny sound they made, every single time they came, _sometimes together, sometimes right after each other_. Their lovemaking continued way into the evening and early night, till at some point Jim fell asleep and Sebastian got out of bed on shaky, tottering legs, and came over to sit on the rug next to him. Sherlock nuzzled his hand and said softly, so as not to wake Jim, “So, how did you guys make up?”

Sebastian stretched out on the rug, “You know kitty, I feel a connection with you, as if we have something or someone in our lives which we both adore and value. Hard to explain but the connection is there. So, you were asking me how we made up, yeah? I gave him a patient hearing as he ranted out everything in his heart and mind. Then I told him about my side of the story. We calibrated, aligned on certain things, kissed and made up.”

“You didn’t give Mycroft a black eye?”

“I wanted to, believe me I wanted to rearrange the facial bones of that man. But I couldn’t, he was apologizing too and he’s already stressed out about his brother and the fight with his fiancé. We decided not to tell Greg…… Mycroft is a good man, you know. He holds a difficult position. He has to answer people who have very high expectations from him and at the same time he has to handle the antics of his brother, who leads a very unconventional life, as does Jim and I must admit Jim gives him a lot of grief. It did shake me up a bit that he had the hots for Jim but then….who wouldn’t have the hots for Jim. Jim’s sexuality is fluid, potent and very on-your-face. I think, it’s the first and only time and he was genuinely regretful, so I forgave him and…..wait, wait-wait-wait….. what’s going on man, have…..have I lost it totally?”

Sherlock blinked at him. _So he was having second thoughts then._

“Did you just _talk_?”

Sherlock spasmed. Yes, the last two sentences/questions out of his mouth, he had heard _himself speak_. A human voice, a man’s voice, his own voice. It was the typical smooth baritone he spoke in. Maybe not so loud or powerful but it was definitely not a cat’s meowing. With great effort, willpower and concentration, he coaxed a mewing sound out of himself. _‘Meeeeewww’_ was all he managed but for that moment it was _enough_ to convince Sebastian. The electric blue eyes narrowed and the blond man let out a warm, throaty chuckle.

“Something is wrong with me,” he said, nuzzling Sherlock’s fur, “I am hearing things! Need to sleep now, okay? You sleep too, here, let me tuck you in.”

“Mmmm……”

“Huh?”

“Muwwww.”

“Oh, good.”

Sherlock hid under his blankie, worried at the transition phase he had gone into. This was new. It hadn’t happened the last time he had turned feline. For the first time he was experiencing the aura of a cat body and human voice. Certainly _freakier and weirder_ than being 100% cat. At least that way he was the only one who knew he was Sherlock trapped in feline form. Now, if he used the human voice, everyone would think he was some lab rat on the loose, half human and half animal, an anomaly and vermination for life on earth.

He fell asleep after a while but kept dreaming about walking around London streets with the head of a human and the body of a cat. He saw everyone laughing and throwing stones at him while he tried to run away from there, calling out to his boyfriend. He wanted to see John, he needed to be held and comforted by the man, he missed him _so much_.

He woke up with a jump, only to find Jim holding him in his arms and caressing his ears. “What cute fluffy ears you have!” Jim said, kissing the top of his head, “Hey, we need to talk. Somewhere else of course, come on, let’s go!” Sherlock startled, unable to see the reasons behind such an intimate request. He looked down at himself, yeah, he was still a cat. Why would Jim Moriarty want to have a chat with a cat? A FELINE? Before he knew what was happening, he was scooped up and carried out of the bedroom. “Shhhh, Sebby is preparing breakfast for all of us,” Jim went on murmuring, “We need to be in the breakfast room in ten minutes. Till then, we can have a quick chat and then….” He trailed off, not completing the full sentence.

Sherlock tried to meow but remembered what had happened the night before. He shut his cat mouth totally.

Jim got into the home office, shut and locked the door, then put Sherlock on the middle of the expensive bespoke desk. “Nice to see you again,” the former criminal said, “You are the cigarette smoking cat I saw in 221B, isn’t it? Tell me the truth, you are Sherlock’s assistant, are you not? Or are you a robot, some kind of a no-human assistant he’s taken on to act as his eyes and ears during cases. That’s why he’s nowhere to be seen and you keep popping up everywhere. Believe me, when I saw you yesterday, I knew Sherlock was behind all of this.”

Sherlock almost did a facepalm/face-paw. Of course, Jim had seen him in his Baker Street flat and would have remembered him. Why didn’t he think of that?

“Let me see if you are just a trained cat or a robot.”

“Noooooo,” Sherlock groaned.

Jim startled, “You speak? Of course you’re a robot.”

He rolled the cat over and started searching every piece of his skin thoroughly. Sherlock gasped and struggled, keeping a lid on his mouth so Jim got no further ideas, and tried to get away from the canny former criminal. But Jim had him well and good, encasing him from all sides using his arms and knees and torso, and continued to search him. “Where is the on/off button, I need to find it,” he giggled, “Once you’re off, I’ll open you up and check the mechanism Sherly had put together. You could be a great discovery…..invention, patented invention!”

Sherlock put on a Herculean effort to sound like a cat and managed to coax out a catlike screech, followed by several whines. _It worked_ and Sebastian came running into the room, unlocking it using a kitchen knife.

“Jimmy babe, what are you doing with Sher Khan?” He asked, quickly taking Sherlock from Jim’s grasp, “You have cat fur all over your desk now. Listen, I remember how you killed that puppy and buried him in the garden and how you tortured those kittens by hanging them on the washing line. But those days are behind you now, aren’t they? Besides, this is our pet, Sher Khan, you can’t treat him this way.”

Jim was initially offended by the sudden interference of his boyfriend. He wanted to say _‘This is Sherlock’s invention and possibly a programmed robot, not a house cat’_ but held back on his words. He didn’t want Sebastian to know that he had told Sherlock about their relationship issues, Seb’s sojourns with Mycroft, and then employed him to spy on Seb and Mycroft and give him proof of his partner’s infidelities. _No more of those things, no more misunderstandings_ , he wanted calm and peace now. “Fine, have it your way,” he huffed at the taller man, “You seem to love that cat more than you love me. And here I thought I was your kitten, you always called me your pretty kitty and…..you even bought cat ears, tail and snout for me.”

“Kitten, I am only asking you to treat Sher Khan with a little compassion.”

“He didn’t treat me with compassion.”

“Huh? What did he do?”

“He….um….he…..”

Sebastian laughed, “You do realize you look very cute and desirable and sexy whenever you get all pouty and jealous!”

“Hmmffff,” Jim crossed his arms over his chest, “Fuck off.”

“I shall only focus on one word you just said, ‘fuck’. C’mon, let’s fuck. No better way to appease a boyfriend than this.”

Immediately they pounced on each other and Jim’s shorts were pushed half way down towards his knees. Kissing and moaning shamelessly, they backheeled out of the room, possibly going to the bedroom while still locked together in a passionate clinch. Sherlock tried to follow them, a bit greedy about ‘visuals’, when the door of the study was slammed right on to him, nearly cutting off his torso into two.

Like the four other times he had ‘died’ _cat deaths_ before, darkness closed in on him as a searing pain rose through his system.

***

When Sherlock came to, he was tucked nicely into his basket and once again saw Jim right before his eyes. A little disoriented, since he was literally back from the _dead_ , he inadvertently let out the words _‘You gotta stop doing that now, you’re freaking me out’_.

The glee on Jim’s face and the way those dark chocolate eyes glowed made him do a face-paw in mortification. Oh darn, what had he done now! He had given the already curious and cruel Jim more reasons to mess with him.

“A talking cat,” Jim squealed, clapping his hands in glee like a child who had just managed to finish his homework, “YOU ARE A TALKING FELINE! You must either be a lab experiment or a robot! Sherlylocks is really a genius. Sometimes he’s a bit naïve, like when I sent him a dildo and convinced him it was a special elephant tusk from India and people hanging it outside their door for good luck…..hahahaha, you should have been how fast his clients ran in the opposite direction when they saw that thing up there, dangling like a …… hey, why do you look so angsty? I am calling your creator a genius and a brilliant man, only his brilliance is sometimes limited by his unnecessary tendency to complicate things. But he created you and I think that’s an amazing achievement.”

“Please,” Sherlock said, “Let me go.”

“Nope. I am going to call Sebby…..”

“You’re _naked._ ”

“So?”

“No, does it not bother you that _I am around_? I might have a camera or some surveillance device implanted in me.”

Jim snort giggled, “You’re real cute, you know that? Nudity isn’t a problem for me, I always look better without my clothes on. By the way, I think you might be more of an android and less of a robot. Nope, not even an android, you are a cyborg! Cat-borg! As an experimental move I crushed you with that door and you actually suffered, so there must be more animal in your than machine. I think you were once a real cat that got converted into…..wait, I think I can hear Sebby coming back.”

“You made me lose my fifth life,” Sherlock growled.

“I said shush, we’ll talk about this later……..”

Before Jim could finish, the door opened and Sebastian came in, dressed in only his boxers. The very look on his face told the entire story and Sherlock knew there was trouble ahead (he was not so taken aback since trouble was what he had been running into for six days running). His fears proved to be true because moments later three masked men walked in behind Sebastian, two of them armed and their guns pointed to the back of the blond man’s head while the third one walked ahead and glared at Jim and cat Sherlock. Then he said something in Mandarin.

“I don’t speak Penguinese,” Jim scoffed. Clearly, he was unbothered by the danger that stared right back at him.

“Pardon me Mr. Moriarty, aka Mr. Sex,” the Chinese man said in a pronounced, thick accent, “I am Wong Lee Guan, remember me? Yes, the same man who asked you for help to overthrow the then Chinese premier and help secure the position for the army general who had connections with the French and Columbian arms traders? Basis your commitment I had taken large sums of loan to pay off those arms traders, sure of the fact that my boy would soon sit on the throne and write off all those loans, but you decided to drop your work, turn into a good boy and marry this dumb blonde……whoaaaaa!” He didn’t get a chance to finish and ended up sprawled on the ground.

Sebastian looked immensely satisfied, “Yeah, take that you trigger happy monkey!”

The gun had gone off and the bullet had hit Sherlock. Once again he felt nausea, pain and debilitating darkness close in as Jim shouted profanities at the Chinese man and Sebastian began to call out ‘Sher Khan’ in needy desperation. The only thoughts in his head as he died for the sixth time in less than six days was _‘John, I want to see John again, every time I die the only person I wish to see once again is John, my Jawn’._

***

“SHERLOCK!!!” John got a start and sat up so fast in the backseat of the car, he hit his head on the roof. Next to him, his colleague and friend from Hungary, Dr. Horváth, looked at him with concern. “John, you had dozed off. It was only a dream. Hey, you look real pale, you _okay_?”

John had seen something terrible. He had just seen Sherlock dying, shot by an unseen assailant, and the very last thing that came out of Sherlock’s mouth was a cry of his name.

Gutted and shaken to the core, he grabbed the arm of his colleague and said, “Bob, I need a favor. I know we have to be here for two more days but by chance can I leave tomorrow morning instead of the evening of day after? I think there is something wrong back home and I really have to be there the soonest I can.” Horváth looked skeptical about that and replied, “Tomorrow morning is the press conference. You need to be co-chairing it John. But afternoon you can leave. That is workable. In the meantime, why don’t you _call home_?”

“I wish,” John looked at Sherlock’s pic on his phone wallpaper, “But his phone is switched off.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know there is a lack of John here after the first chapter. But I promise to make it up with JohnLock hotness later in the story!


	10. John freaks out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Teflon coated cat or a catoid, Jim and Sebastian wonder what this unique feline might be. In the meantime, John Watson has reasons to be worried, very worried!

“Sher Khan, Sher Khan, yes, you’re alive, thank God, please look at us now.”

Sherlock moaned since he was still _a bit sore_ from his ‘death’, then groaned when he realized where he was. A store room, locked in, along with Jim and Sebastian. “See,” Sebastian said as he petted and stroked Sherlock, “I told you he was a brave cat, very brave and tenacious.”

“Oh he is strong, courageous and Teflon coated but the best thing is that he’s just a cat,” Jim seemed very happy to declare that and when Sebastian gave him a quizzical and puzzled glance he added, “Okay, I’ll confess! I was seriously suspecting him to be the feline version of a cyborg or some android/humanoid…..catoid if I may call it so! You won’t believe it but this morning he was talking to me like a person would, in a human voice, in fact it was a very familiar human voice. I had seen him in 221B when I had gone to say hi to Sherlock, the same cat, same color and expressions, only back then he meowed. I thought he was a robot or a cyborg with built-in surveillance devices, sent out to keep an eye on us.”

Sebastian raised his brows, “You heard that too? The human voice, I mean.”

“So you heard as well?”

“Yes, I thought I was too tired, my brain was fried and……”

“Thank God. You were so biased about the cat that you’d started doubting me.”

“But how does he speak in a human voice? Have you considered that Jimmy?”

“How the fuck should I know Tiger? I didn’t build him or birth him.”

Sebastian frowned in mild annoyance, “But you’re supposed to be the _genius_. If Sherlock can build or alter a cat and insert it with human speech-delivering abilities, then can’t you at least figure out how he does it and to what extent the cat can emulate a human being? I thought both of you were the same levels of genius and if one does something, the other automatically figures out a way to do better.”

Jim scowled, “Did Sherlock figure out how I blew up that gas station without damaging even a single window pane of the next house? Has he figured out yet that the skull he considers a companion is actually with me and I replaced it with a new one, with cameras and microphones built in. Do you think he even understands how I manipulated a bunch of minor royals and middle-level ministers into recommending my legitimacy and pardon?”

“ENOUGH.”

Jim and Sebastian got the shock of their lives when they heard the voice right behind them.

“Yes, I am talking to both of you,” Sherlock said, defiant and throwing caution to the winds, “Don’t you think you should be trying to get out of this danger rather than debate on who is the bigger genius? I can’t believe this, we are locked into a room and there are some madmen loose outside, yet all you guys can think about is a talking cat? What’s such a big deal about a talking cat, huh?”

He felt secretly pleased of his achievement. He had quieted the two men down and they were stunned into silence. However, his sense of pride was short-lived when Jim suddenly quipped, “Do you speak other languages? I mean I can build a robot who speaks at least six. Just trying to find out how far Sherly has gone ahead of me in terms of building……”

“For God’s sake Jim,” Sherlock began, getting frustrated by then, “What did I just say? This isn’t the right time or place to do a comparative analysis between two geniuses, not when danger stares us right into our faces…….” He didn’t get a chance to elaborate further as they heard footsteps, voices, an odd shout and then weird clanging sounds and scraping sounds. Suddenly the doorknob turned and the North Korean entered the room, his grumpy face resembling an overturned sauce pot. Sherlock gave Sebastian the side-eye, “Go for it, colonel. You can break his neck with one single blow. What are you waiting for? Your Jim’s safety depends on it.”

“I can’t. They have a big stash of RDX with a remote controlled spark plug inserted into the heart of it. Anything happens to any one of the three of them and this whole floor will blow up. But I have ensured I gave out the distress signal to Mycroft before we were thrown in here.”

“I don’t think that matters now.”

“WHAT?” Seb and Cat Sherlock asked together.

Jim sighed and pointed at the doorway, “Too late.”

Greg and Mycroft were pushed into the room, both kicked in the rear by the Chinese gang leader. Behind him appeared the rogue agent who had masterminded it all. And she was….a woman! A carrot topped woman of six feet height and lean build, with a swan like neck and stork like legs. He drawback were her slightly too small eyes and slightly too big mouth, her facial features, no doubt re-aligned surgically, still looked pretty incongruous.

“Give us the newly-built, tested and validated compound with all the notes you’ve written on it,” she warned in a shrill voice, “This needs to happen before the Central Board of Science, Astrophysics and Technology patent this and make is redundant for the rest of the world.”

“Keep talking darling,” Jim sang, “I took you down before, I can do that again. You know that.”

“Correction, I _knew_ that,” she said with a laugh, “Now I know something different. That Jim Moriarty, the Spider, had no attachments and connections, nothing to lose, was a raving madman who could do anything to cause trouble. This one, while still mischievous and cunning, has a boyfriend, a pet cat, loyalty towards my ex-boss Mycroft and doesn’t want his name to be associated with anything illegal. Fear makes you vulnerable Moriarty and connections make you prone to being taken advantage of.”

“What do you really want Agent 009…..I mean Silver. What’s motivated you to do these batshit crazy things of late?” Mycroft asked in a cold, sterile voice, eyes focused on the rogue agent.

“You and your brother,” she spat out as her North Korean and Chinese accomplices stood on either side, guns raised at them, “You guys used me and left me to die in Saudi Arabia, where I got captured. Sherlock ran away by sea route and Mycroft ensured all the trails were destroyed. None of you even thought that without any support, accomplices or funds, how the fuck would I get out of there? But I did get out, guess how? I had to sell myself in a dozen different ways to buy my freedom and when I did, I had already met these two jokers. Everyone had a bone to pick with Mycroft and I had one to pick with Jim…..bloody idiot, joining this snake of a man who can’t even look after his own aides.”

“Correction,” Jim said coldly, “You knew what you’d signed up for. What do you mean he can’t look after his operatives? It’s understood that if you are caught or compromised, you’re on your own. You’re not the first one who went through this. Even in my web we had the same rule.”

“I make the rules now,” she snarled, “Now I’ll decide whether you live or die.” She slammed the door shut on their faces.

“We should have gone to the Conduit Street or Belgravia or Mayfair Road flat,” Sebastian said through gritted teeth, “This one has the least security and practically no surveillance around it.”

“Don’t bicker,” Mycroft said.

“Shut up,” Jim went.

“What do we do now?” Sebastian snapped.

“How is Papyrus here?” Greg suddenly said, making the conversation come to a grinding halt as everyone, including Cat Sherlock, stared at the DI I absolute shock. “Papyrus,” Greg pointed at the feline, “How is it possible that he’s here? I thought he was injured and had died, run off somewhere, I thought of a million possibilities but seeing him here, with Jim and Sebastian, nope, never even considered that scenario.”

“Greg darling, we are in the midst of a complicated scenario here,” Mycroft began but Jim shushed him by giving his shoulder a hard squeeze. “Wait, this cat was in your house Lestrade?”

“Yes. Why?”

“He was in Sherlock’s house too. Now my suspicions are confirmed.”

“What?” Everyone asked together.

Jim picked Sherlock up and held him like the baboon in Lion King had held up the little Simba. With a sheepish look he said, “I have a confession to make. When I realized something was off about Sebby, I had called and asked Sherlock to find out what was going on. I spoke to him and he agreed to take the case, then he invited me to his place for dinner, but when I got to 221B there was no Sherlock. The only living thing I saw was this creature, this cat, sitting on Sherlock’s chair and smoking a cigarette. Yes, he was smoking a cigarette. Frankly speaking, I through Sherlock had trained him and helped him imbibe some human skills and habits but now I know….he is….this cat is…..a very advanced robot.”

Sherlock was dismayed.

“The only way to find out what it is,” Jim continued, “Is to cut it open and…..”

“Noooo,” Greg said, “Poor Papyrus.”

“You want to save Papyrus or yourself?”

“What do you mean?”

“Unless we find out what this robot is and how to make it work, we can’t contact Sherlock. It seems he’s the only one who can help us out of this mess. Now with Mycroft here too, it’s very likely that bitch will try to strike a bargain with the government, with Mi6 and trade our lives for that invention of mine. Worse, they might even kill us after they get what they want. I know these people, in their world the worst mistake is to leave a witness alive.”

“I agree,” Sebastian replied.

“I DO NOT,” Sherlock snarled.

Jim gasped and tossed Sherlock down on the ground. The cat somersaulted and landed immaculately on the ground, then spoke in a human voice. “No matter how hard you throw a cat or how high you toss it up, it will mostly land on its feet.”

“Sherlock!!!” Mycroft looked astonished beyond words.

“Brother mine,” Sherlock snorted, “A cigarette please.”

“It-It-It wants a cig,” Greg said, looking at Sherlock as if he was some dinosaur that had come to life and walked straight out of a museum exhibit, “It’s g-got Sherlock’s voice!”

“We had sex with him present in the room,” Sebastian looked at Jim, flabbergasted, “ _Full-blown anal sex!_ He watched us going at it for hours…..oh God, what is going on in this world. Could he not have just…..left the room like a decent cat….I mean human?”

Only Jim seemed completely at ease with the sudden discovery of Sherlock’s identity. “Hey Mycroft,” he looked at the Mi6 chief, amusement lacing his voice, “For Heaven’s sake, give the poor thing a cigarette! He looks like he really needs a dose of nicotine.”

Hands shaking, Mycroft offered Sherlock a cigarette while Jim offered him a seat on the only chair in the store room. It took Sherlock some time to grip the cigarette with both paws and the lighter had to be held for him to light his smoke, but eventually he managed it quite smoothly. After taking in a few drags and letting out a few smoke rings, he looked at the four pairs of eyes staring at him in astonishment/amusement and said, “What? I had experimented on form-change and shapeshifting some time ago. I never wanted this, okay? Took the pill by mistake. But I am half human now. My voice is back. Earlier I could only meow but now I can….well, talk. Tomorrow evening or day after morning I’ll be back to my human form.”

“This isn’t happening,” Greg turned to Mycroft, “Slap me.”

“No Minnie,” Mycroft refused.

“Allow me,” Jim grinned sneakily and slapped the DI. “Ouch, I am awake, this isn’t a dream,” Greg muttered, rubbing his stinging cheek.

“He watched us having sex,” Sebastian repeated like a parrot.

“Oh shut it,” Jim was nonchalant, “He’s a bit of a voyeur. But that’s no problem, it’s not like he recorded us or something.”

“For Christ’s sake,” Mycroft sudden butted in, “We are in the custody of three dangerous, unhinged criminals. Instead of discussing sex and cats and slapping each other we have to find a way out of this. It’s a matter of national importance and…..Sherlock, what do you think we should do? Jim was very confident you can get us out of here, so what plans or ideas do you have for the escape?”

“Well,” Sherlock felt much better now that the truth was out, he had smoked a much needed cigarette and had found his human voice, “I do have an idea. Simple one really. As Jim once said, not every single problem needs to have a complex reason behind it and an even more complicated solution. What I intend to do is very easy but all of you need to play a part in it. You guys ready?”

“Yeah,” Jim seemed excited, “What part do I play?”

“The easiest one Jim,” Sherlock licked at one of his paws, “You need to play your former self.”

***

Dr. John Hamish Watson was sitting at the crowded, busy airport, hoping he got a seat confirmed on a flight that day. _Any flight would do._ He just had to return home and see Sherlock with his own eyes. Strange fears were swirling in his heart and doomsday scenarios were flying about in his head, increasing in frequency and intensity as the hours passed.

Why had Sherlock not called or texted him even once? He was 100% sure the text he had received after that chat with Mycroft was sent by the elder Holmes _himself_. Sherlock never called him ‘Hammy’ lovingly, he usually called him so when he was angry. Mycroft had miscalculated the usage of the word and used the _insult_ as an _endearment_ in the text he sent. But again…..why was he _lying_ to John?

“Should have never come here, this is utter nonsense….” he muttered to himself, startling the young mother sitting next to him with a wailing baby in her arms and another noisy toddler running around. Giving him a sour look, she got up and walked off in a huff while the little brat stuck his tongue out at him whilst leaving. “Of all things weird and unfair……” John grumbled, realizing that the woman had probably taken his words as a complaint against her and her noisy kids. Like many young parents she had developed sudden deafness in public places while her kids continued to be shrill and loud and expected others to grin and bear it, because kids were ‘cute’ right? Naturally to hear the person sitting at your elbow _complain about them_ was a big ‘letdown’ for her.

He stared at his phone.

_No calls, no messages, no nothing._

“Please Sherlock, please,” he implored, praying and hoping he got some indication his man was doing well, “Some signal, one line text, _anything_ , please.”

_He is a detective. He’s been in far worse situations. Don’t be ridiculous. By now you should be used to this John._

John sighed. Maybe he _was_ freaking out too _easily_. He had to be stronger, more objective and tolerant of these situation. He had to deal with _ambiguity_ and _uncertainty_.

He had no idea how long he was sitting there, waiting for the next flight to be announced so he could check with the ticketing clerk if she could get him one seat on the crowded plane, when he felt his phone vibrate. A call was coming in. _Unknown number_. Maybe it was _Sherlock_.

“Hello?”

“Hey there…..Jawn.”


	11. The fat but not fat feline

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I agree, it’s a very creepy cat,” Guan said with a shudder, “Very fat and heavy too."
> 
> “Don’t you dare call me fat again you motherfucker,” Sherlock shook a paw at the closed door, snarling with rage. 
> 
> “They took my Jim,” Sebastian yelled, shooting the door and littering it with holes, “They took my kitten away from me.”

The deep baritone, the mellifluous flow of words, those familiar sounds of breathing, _yes_ , finally he had got a call from his man, _his_ Sherlock. A huge grin spread on John’s face and he shot up from the uncomfortable plastic chair.

“Sherlock!!! Sherlock…..my love, how are you? Where are you? I have been waiting for a call or text from you for several days now. I called you so many times, texted you, sent you WhatsApp messages and pictures from the conference I attended, I had even called Mycroft to find out about you but, somehow, we still couldn’t connect. Even Mycroft was evasive in his answers. What have you been up to? What’s going on? No, forget it, just tell me, how are you? Why aren’t you saying something……”

His breathless questioning stopped when he heard Sherlock chuckle softly, making him pause and bite his lip in embarrassment. John realized that he had just sounded like an overprotective mother hen or some clingy wife, bombarding Sherlock with a barrage of questions before the man had even got a chance of say anything more than John’s name. Sheepishly he scratched the back of his head and waited for his partner to answer, which Sherlock did shortly after finishing a series of soft, amused giggled and laughs. “I’d speak as soon as you give me a chance to,” the detective said, “Now you have, so I am answering. I am fine. A bit of a tricky case I am handling but it’s all under control. Nothing for you to worry about.”

“You don’t call in the middle of a case unless one of the following three scenarios happen. You are in some sort of trouble, you want my help with something, you have run into some trouble with the law, authorities or Mycroft. So, which one is it?”

“Um…..all three.”

“I knew it. I just knew it. Is it….is it too bad?”

“Um…..no.”

“How can I help?”

“I need you to note down this number and then call it in precisely one hour, fifteen minutes and thirty-seven seconds. Will you be able to do this for me Jawn?”

John rolled his eyes, “Oh come on baby! I have done more than this for you in the past and will do much more than this in the future, no questions asked. It’s a very simple task really, yes of course I can do it.”

“Good…..um…..our lives depend on it, so……”

John gripped the phone with both hands, “Sherlock, love, you’re not telling me everything.”

“I will, when you’re home I’ll tell you everything in detail. Just remember, one hour, fifteen minutes and now…..seven seconds.”

“But Sherlock, just let me know one thing, are you……..oh man, he’s hung up,” John stared at the phone sullenly and then set an alarm on his cell phone.

***

After stealthily stepping around the kitchen, Sherlock managed to slide under a cabinet and wait there until he saw that carrot-haired woman get up from the kitchen chair and walk out, calling one of her associates. Sherlock’s eyes gleamed when he saw that she had left the phone there and in no time he pounced on it, put it on silent, then carried it into one of the bathrooms. Once there, he called John. John’s cooperation was crucial for him to win this round. As the good doctor answered his call, a warm and fuzzy feeling spread in Sherlock’s chest. ‘Hey there……Jawn!’

It took him around three minutes to finish that conversation, then another three to slither out of the kitchen window and make that perilous walk on the parapet that led to the store room window. He squeezed in with some difficulty, wondering how, despite his slender frame as a human, he had turned into quite a plump cat. 

“Here,” Sherlock handed the phone to Jim and said, “Do your thing.” The Irishman winked and began to work on the phone, using nothing but a Swiss knife that Sebastian had in his pocket. He programmed and reprogrammed the phone, his evil grin broadening as he got closer and closer to his goal. Mycroft paced about, looking a bit tense, mainly because Greg was also there and clearly he was worried about his soon-to-be-husband. Sherlock sat on the chair, adjusting his whiskers and snapping at the pollens flying in the air (something his feline nature forced him to do, he was unable to stop himself). “Calm down,” he said, “Brother mine.”

“Yeah, I should, shouldn’t it?” Mycroft asked with a huge dollop of sarcasm.

“You of all people should never lose your cool,” Sherlock countered, “You’re the Iceman. Hey Jim, you call him the Iceman, right?”

“Yeah-Yeah-Yeah,” Jim answered without even looking their way. He focused completely on the task he was doing.

“I am stuck in a store room, my brother has turned into a house cat, his partner isn’t here and I lied to him in the past saying Sherlock is fine, we stand a chance of being killed by our enemies, all three of them are total psychos, my soon to be husband may not live to walk down the aisle with me, oh yes, of course, I should be cool as a cucumber. Anyone else in my place would have gone up in flames by now.”

“Whose fault is it that we are all in this situation?” Sherlock asked.

“You are a cat,” Mycroft said irritably, “Just stop talking…..it seems fairly weird.”

‘Uh-Oh’ Jim went, as he put the finishing touches to his work on the phone. Greg Lestrade gave Mycroft a glare and said ‘Stop it, this is not the time to fight, he’s trying to help’. Sebastian sneered at everyone except for Jim, and, for some odd reason, kept caressing Sherlock’s tail. The feline sleuth frowned at his brother, snarled like a wild cat and answered in his human voice which, with the passage of every hour, was beginning to sound more and more like Sherlock’s original sassy and sexy baritone. “Weird is when you are about to marry someone but choose to sleep with someone else. For example……mmffgggggnnnn……” He couldn’t finish the sentence since Sebastian had gagged him by covering his mouth with one of his hands.

“You promised NEVER to talk about this,” the former sniper growled.

“Meow.”

“Don’t meow like a cat. Just say _, I promise_. Swear on the person you really care about, maybe _yourself_?”

“Promise. And no, I am not such a huge dick, _not so selfish_. I do care about others so…..I swear on John. _Swear on Jawn_!”

“Jim, remember, _you promised too_ ,” Sebastian said to his partner who was doing a small experiment on the phone he had reprogrammed. The lights around them began to flicker and blink, the electronically operated window pane also closed and reopened on its own. “Jim,” Sebastian insisted, “I am talking to you.”

“What do you want me to do? Swear or promise?”

“Both,” Sebastian insisted.

“Can’t. I can promise but if I swear on you…..you might just die!”

At this even Sherlock began to laugh loudly. It sounded pretty devilish, half human and half feline and an annoyed Jim snapped at him, “Don’t. You sound very weird.”

“If one more person calls me weird…..I swear, I swear…..I swear I am going to…..” Sherlock flared up, stammering with anger. Mycroft looked pleased as punch, smirking as if he had just been vindicated. Greg looked at his fiancé, confusion clouding his face and tone, and asked, “What is going on Mike? I have a strong feeling something happened which I should know about?”

“What’s going on here?” The Korean stepped in, holding his machine gun aloft.

“Nothing,” Sebastian shrugged.

Jim hid the phone quickly. Mycroft added, “We were just…..talking.”

“Wait a moment, what’s going on _here_?” the Korean narrowed his eyes in suspicion, “I just heard another person’s voice, and it was NOT any of _yours_ , so who else is in this room?” He stepped in and gave each of them a glare, trying to assess them and their intentions, “I heard you,” he pointed at Mycroft, “And you,” he pointed at Sebastian, “Also you,” he gave a glance at Jim and “You too” and leered at Greg Lestrade who self-consciously looked down at himself. Sherlock slid under a chair, then climbed on to a shelf and finally jumped up on top of a cabinet and skillfully walked to the edge of it without making any sound. Finally, he managed to get to a point where he stood right above the Korean man’s head, evil look in his green glittering eyes.

“Up there,” Jim pointed cheekily, “He spoke.”

The man looked up. “The house cat?”

“No ordinary cat, he speaks.”

“Oh yeah? C’mon kitty-kitty-kitty, meow meow, show me your fangs and claws.”

The Korean mocked Sherlock and lifted him in his arms, laughing derisively, “This furball was speaking? What do you take me for, Moriarty?”

Jim laughed even more derisively, “Moron.”

“What? What did you say?”

Sherlock put his paw right before the man’s face and said, “Did you call me cute? Did you want to see my claws?”

The look of alarm on the man’s face was worth a second look. Everyone stared in amusement and anticipation and the Korean stared at Sherlock in disbelief and petrified silence, as if he was watching a creepy horror movie come to life. Sherlock let out that ghoulish snicker and suddenly sharp bendy claws popped out of his fluffy, furry paw and he slashed the man’s face with them, drawing blood. The assassin bellowed with pain and clutched his face, during which Sherlock jumped off and said ‘Now’.

Sebastian turned his head north-south and cracked his neck while Jim quickly put the re-programmed phone in the now-dead man’s grip. Greg picked up the machine gun, just in time before Silver and Guan came rushing in with similar weapons. Suddenly there was a face-off.

“Wait,” Mycroft intervened, “Stop, we can sort this out by discussing it. No need to let the bullets fly, yet.”

“I don’t care about my life but this guy gets it,” Silver pointed her weapon at Sebastian, “You killed my accomplice. You’ll be sorry for being such an impulsive asshole colonel. If we wished, we could have dropped a couple of you but we didn’t do that, did we? Now I think I would.”

“NO,” Guan stopped her, “We aren’t here to shoot people randomly. We want those files. Let’s get those files and get the fuck out of here.”

Silver seemed reluctant to agree to a parley but eventually the Chinese gang leader prevailed and, post a quick discussion amongst themselves in Mandarin, the former operative relented. “Fair enough,” she said scornfully, “If Moriarty will still not talk or give us what we want, then he and his beloved cat will go with us as hostages. The rest of you are of no use to us and, since we are not safe here, this negotiation shall continue from our hideout.” She pointed her gun straight at Jim and grabbed Sherlock by the tail, picking him up in an awkward manner and rather painfully, “Let’s go, move your cute arse Moriarty.” Sherlock felt pain shoot up from his tail, right up his spine and ending at the back of his head. He swore colorfully, _“Watch out you bottle blond bitch.”_

“Fuck, _shut up_ Sher….Sher…..Sher…..Sher Khan?” Sebastian arrested his mistake rather cleverly and gave a sheepish grin.

Jim held his breath.

Silver and Guan stared at each other. Fortunately for Sherlock, the two antagonists were so astonished by him speaking that they didn’t pay any heed to what Sebastian had just _almost_ said. “Did you hear that?”

“Yeah, that thing spoke?”

“No, impossible.”

“Even Kim came in to check the same thing. He kept hearing an unfamiliar voice in here.”

“You guys realize I have a gun too,” Sebastian tried to end the matter then and there, “It’s stupid to think you can even get away with this.”

“Careful colonel,” Guan laughed at the tall man, “We have set up this place with enough explosives to take you guys high up to the skies, maybe on Seventh Heaven! If you try to stop us, if you make any false moves, your pretty boyfriend and his fat cat will both be on Cloud Nine, that too in separate pieces. The best way is to remain where you are whilst we take our hostages and leave. As soon as Moriarty gives us what we want, he and his fat cat will be released and set free.”

“You’re the fat bastard, look at you……” Sherlock muttered.

“It spoke again?” Silver gave him a suspicious look.

“Meow-Meoaw-Meeaaoww,” Sherlock went, sounding awfully like a man imitating a cat.

“I agree, it’s a very _creepy_ cat,” Guan said with a shudder, “Very fat and heavy too. Let’s just take Moriarty with us. He was our original target and should serve the purpose” With that, he suddenly and unceremoniously threw Sherlock right at Sebastian’s face and dragged Jim away, Silver quickly shutting the door behind them. Sebastian, taken aback, fell back again the wall with Sherlock draped around his neck and shoulders like a fur-lined thick scarf. The light machine gun fell from his hands and slid across the floor, coming to a stop as it hit Mycroft’s toes. “Don’t you dare call me fat again you _motherfucker_ ,” Sherlock shook a paw at the closed door, snarling with rage.

“They took my Jim,” Sebastian yelled, shooting the door and littering it with holes, “They took my kitten away from me.”

“Wait,” Sherlock said, “All is not lost yet. Jim knows what to do…..”

“We were supposed to knock them out and put them on a U-Haul truck and then use the trick with the phone. Jim was supposed to be with us when we do that thing. Now he’s with them and there’s no fucking way we can do anything. The entire bloody plan has gone bust.”

“No, it’s not.”

“How the fuck do you know?”

“Because I have faith on Jim’s abilities to get out of their clutches.”

“You really think you know him better than me?”

The fur on the back of Sherlock’s feline self, stood-up at right angles to his body as the detective grew more and more agitated. He was beginning to feel a bit dizzy, very irritable, itchy all over and some of his joints ached. “Yes,” he snapped, “I know him better because he is……me!”

Greg turned towards Mycroft, “We should stop them Mickie. It’s funny, watching a full-grown man fighting with a cat.”

“Nah,” Mycroft said dismissively, “Too much leg work. I’d rather send out distress signals to my team so they come over, let us out, plus scan the place and safely remove the bombs.”

Just then the door opened and Jim stood grinning. “Make that phone call Sherly,” he said cockily as he walked into Sebastian’s waiting arms, “Silver’s phone is set up exactly the way it should be. Their entire gang is in a van now, safe distance from here, all tied up and gagged.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for still reading this one. Feline Sherlock will win soon and his 'Jawn' will be back with him.


	12. Humanity returns

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Can I help you sir?” 
> 
> Sherlock looked at the concierge. “Can you sneak me back into that flat?” 
> 
> “I think you better leave the premises mister.”

“I….um…..Mycroft, can you call your men?” Sherlock asked, “My paw and all that…..”

Mycroft turned his pockets inside out, “I don’t have a phone. They _took_ it. Same for Greg.”

“If _I have to do everything_ ,” Jim rolled his eyes and extricated himself from Sebastian’s clinging embrace, “Then I shall. Fine, keep sitting on your arses while I look for the phones. They were not carrying any when they left the building so the devices must be somewhere here, in this house or just outside……oh shit, see what they have done to our phones, those rotten imbeciles.” He pointed at a large water-filled tumbler in the kitchen sink into which the phones, _all four of them_ , had been mercilessly dunked. “I have many more phones though,” Jim said when he saw the dismayed look on everyone’s faces, “Sebby and I have more phones than McDonalds has hamburgers. Give me a few minutes, oh no, how will I do this now? I don’t have her number.”

“Who says we need to call Silver’s phone?” Sherlock said, trying to get up but finding it difficult to coordinate his movements properly, “I meant, Mycroft’s team of operatives.”

“How do we track the location of that gang then?” Sebastian asked, “Don’t tell me we have no plan for that.”

“Stop your yelling,” Sherlock suddenly found his tolerance for noise going low, “If you were so bothered why didn’t you point it out when we formed the plan? Why did you break that man’s neck and put a spanner in our work?”

“You know what, you were better off as Sher Khan,” Sebastian twisted Sherlock’s ear.

“LET GO you overgrown baboon,” Sherlock shouted.

Sebastian chased after him with a knife, “That’s it. That’s enough your condescending prick.”

“Go ahead, _stab me_.”

“Oh you bet I will. _Watch me_.”

“I still have three lives left. Hee-hee-hee!”

“STOP,” Mycroft’s sudden loud voice startled everyone into silence and everybody froze, Sebastian with his arm raised in which he held the knife, Sherlock under the table, Jim with his hands dunked into the tumbler from which he was trying to retrieve the now-defunct phones. “We have to make that call and track their location or else they will get away. Even my team won’t be able to find them later. If they get away Jim won’t be safe, nor will any of us be safe because such people always come back for what they missed.”

“Don’t worry brother mine,” Sherlock said as his body was racked by shivers and cramps, he keeled forward slightly, “I had made a back up plan…..in my Jawn.”

“Guys,” Greg picked Sherlock up in his arms, “I don’t think Papyrus….I mean Sherlock is feeling too well. He is shivering……”

“Here, give him to me, he’s got a bit dirty as I see,” Mycroft took his brother’s feline form into his arms and started to brush off the dust and crumbs off from his fur, “Seriously, had it not been Sherlock I would have displayed him on television. This is a breakthrough drug, whatever he has developed, turning a human form into feline, but with the same qualities as before. He was just as annoying, cocky, defiant and smartass as he is as a man…..in fact, now that I think about it, just as flat-footed when he walked. How did I not see this before? We should have recorded him as a cat talking in human voice, _just for memories you see_ , and even as a cat he was intelligent enough and solved the problem for us…….”

“Mycroft,” Jim called out.

“The drug, I want to have it tested in the Mi6 lab.”

“Mike,” Greg warned him.

“What?”

“He’s growing bigger,” Sebastian pointed.

“Who….you mean to say…..oh…..he’s growing heavier too…..”

Before Mycroft could even finish the sentence or take any redeeming measures, Sherlock turned into his human form. Just as it had happened over a year ago with John, Sherlock turned human in Mycroft’s arms and the elder sibling landed on the floor on his arse, surprised and unprepared for the transformation. Before he knew it he was buried under the weight of his six footer brother.

“Unnngggggg!”

“Ohhhhh, my head!”

“Hnnnnnn!”

“Ouch, I can’t move my limbs.”

“Sebby,” Jim shrieked with laughter at the groaning Sherlock and the seriously compromised Mycroft, “Get Mycroft out of there before the poor man dies in his business suit….though I think that’s what he’d eventually prefer when he goes. But it’s not time for him yet and not in this manner.” He giggled and did a little jig, “Ohhhh, what fun! The Holmes brothers stacked one on top of the other.”

Right at that moment a massive explosion happened somewhere close by.

Sebastian had steely nerves but even he seemed to react with shock when things around him shook from the impact of that explosion. They heard shouts on the streets and the sounds of glass cracking and shattering and car alarms beeping loudly. Even in his near immobile state Sherlock managed to jump a little and rolled off Mycroft who took deep, shuddering breaths when the weight of his brother, literally and figuratively, lifted off his chest. Greg’s reaction was almost comical as he grabbed a table and put it sideways up on the floor, making a ‘shield’ for himself, Mycroft and Sherlock. “Hahahahaha, mission accomplished,” Jim clapped his hands, his face a study of glee and wicked joy.

“Wait,” Sherlock said feebly, “Is that those bozos dying?”

“Exploding,” Jim replied, “But yeah, you can call it dying.”

“You were supposed to program the phone to track them, not to blow them up.”

“But you told me Sherly, I only need to be me, I need to be Moriarty. Moriarty never took prisoners.”

“Yeah, Moriarty liked to blow things….and people, up!”

“Precisely.”

Sebastian butted in, “I hate to intrude into your conversation Mr. Genius and Mr. Brilliant, but may I point out that Sherlock is naked?”

Sherlock was too tired and wasted to say something but when he looked down his nude form, he blushed a very bright shade of red. He heard the ever naughty Jim say to Sebastian ‘I told you he likes the bush’ and Mycroft make a silly comment like ‘The Hulk always kept his pants on, even when he changed shape and size’. It was only Greg who sounded sensible and barked at Sebastian saying ‘Give the man a towel or robe or a pair of your track pants, now!’

***

Sherlock woke up many hours later, a bit dazed and disoriented, feeling a bit sore still, a little bit itchy here and there and a dry mouth. He gulped down both glasses of water kept on the nightstand next to him and sat up in bed, trying to figure out where he was.

He found a note next to his pillow. _‘Sherlock, meatloaf and salad in the kitchen – SM’_

He got out of bed…..ouch…..something dropped to the ground, around his ankles. _Oops_ , they were his boxers, _no_ , they were _someone else’s boxers_ because they were way too big and his narrow hips couldn’t hold them up. Awkwardly he gathered them up, used the drawstring (thank God drawstrings had been invented) to tighten the garment around his waist, and headed to the kitchen to fill his growling stomach.

The kitchen clock said it was 3 am. The last time he remembered seeing the clock was shortly before he had turned human, which was around 3 pm. _Gosh_ , did he really pass out for twelve hours straight.

Whatever it was, he felt much better now, almost human in fact. There was a strong urge to walk on four legs and he kind of missed swishing his tail around but other than that he was his former self once more. Thank Heavens, _it was good to be human again_! He heated up the meatloaf in the oven, already digging into the salad that had been kept in a deep dish next to the toaster. The crunchy leaves, the apricot bits, the cherry tomatoes, they went down incredibly well and he looked for something to drink. He opened the fridge, it was stocked like someone was preparing for a food crisis that could last for weeks. It was so full that Sherlock was assaulted by a cabbage and a packet of cherries the moment he opened it.

He put them away somehow, when his eyes fell on a bottle kept on the door. A bottle of strawberry flavored milk with a tag _‘Hey kitty-kitty-kitty, drink your milk, do not forget, do not scowl because I know you like it – JM’_ stuck on it.

“Twat,” Sherlock snarled but drank from the bottle anyways, eyebrows waggling as he realized it did really taste good. As he finished the milk, he saw a note stuck in the bottom of it, readable only after the bottle had been drained. _‘I told you so kitty, hope you liked your milk – JM’_

“Brat,” Sherlock shook his head with a smile and started to eat the meatloaf, surprised with his appetite. Then it struck him how little he had eaten as a feline and how his body seemed to be catching up on all its needs now, sleep, food, cuddles…..cuddles? Yes, he needed _cuddles._

_He needed John._

_No worries Sherlock, John is back tomorrow night. Only one day to go. You’ll make it._

Hunger satisfied, he looked around and realized he was in the same flat where the whole drama of the rogue agent, the assassin and the gang leader had taken place. But the flat looked clean, untouched, pristine, everything in its place. Mycroft’s team must have come over and tidied up after collecting all evidence and removing the ‘body’. Thank God he had slept through it all. But where was Mycroft? Where was his phone? Where were Jim and Sebastian?

Thoughtlessly he padded to the master-bedroom and opened the door, not bothering to knock. He was not such a savage usually but a week of being a feline had changed his habits somewhat. He didn’t even think about announcing himself or taking permission as he stepped inside, his green eyes widening in surprise and thrill when he saw Jim in cat ears and tail and Sebastian in a tiger skin body suit having wild sex on the huge king-size bed.

“Oooohhh,” Jim went, then quickly _corrected_ himself, “Meow!”

“Grrrrrr,” Sebastian made a hilariously weird tiger growl and continued to plow into Jim whose _flexibility_ amazed Sherlock to no end. How could someone stay balanced on his head and neck while his torso was mostly suspended in air and his arms and legs spread apart like that of a starfish. Equally admirable was Sebastian’s stamina because from their dirty-talk Sherlock deduced this was their fifth round that night. Seriously, did the colonel have a secret tank of semen to be unleashed at will, like the underground fuel storage tanks beneath gas stations!!! Sherlock watched, _eyes agape, tongue hanging loose_ (a la feline style, it would take some time to get rid of that habit!) as the sexy, porn-like show continued for several minutes before both men concluded it with matching creamy explosions.

Sherlock knew he should leave quietly but his feet were rooted to the spot, his dick was throbbing in his boxers (Sebastian’s boxers, he realized now) and he simply couldn’t control his slightly heavy and erratic breathing. Jim, even in his _supine_ state, detected his presence.

“Sebby?”

“Mmmm, my kitten?”

“Don’t look now, but I have a feeling we are being _watched_.”

“Whoa! He is awake?”

“Did you lock the door? If not, do it now…..”

“I told you repeatedly babe that we should send him over with his big brother, so he could recover in _Mycroft’s_ Hyde Park residence. But you insisted on being _nice_! Nice gets you nothing in this world, except for a voyeur. Too late to lock the door now, look over there!”

“SHERLYLOCKS!!!”

“……ya”

“Don’t you have any sense of personal space, time, moment? You’re not even a virgin anymore, has Dr. Watson not trained you at all?”

“Um……” Sherlock was bright red once again, _sheesh he was caught_ , “I was just leaving.”

“NO,” Jim growled, “YOU ARE LEAVING RIGHT NOW.”

In about ten minutes Sherlock was standing outside the apartment block, dressed in Sebastian’s oversized clothes, dismayed look on his face and his now-defunct phone and a bag of cash in his hands. “Do you realize how I look,” he snarled up at the windows of the flat that belonged to Sebastian and Jim, “Fifty thousand dollars, someone else’s clothes, on the streets at 4 am and without a vehicle, I seem like a bloody hooker. Nice way to treat someone who got you and your sex-on-legs boyfriend back together again.”

“The fifty thousand dollars is for that honey,” Jim yelled back from the window, “We took care of you and fed you and clothed you, not to mention I had to clean cat fur from all over my flat for most of the evening. And I think I let you stay long enough here, now be gone. Meow!”

The great detective shook his fist at the grinning Jim who had stuck his head out of the window, only to be shown the middle finger. The cheek of that Irishman, signing off with a ‘meow’. Sherlock knew Jim had been generous with the payment but he would have gladly traded that off with a chance to see him in action in bed with Sebastian again. The _cat ears_ and _tail_ had enticed him profoundly and he couldn’t wait to try out something similar with John _. But he had no idea where to find those_. Before he could ask he had been shooed out like he was a house cat…..oh well, he _had been_ a house cat for almost a whole week but that situation existed no more, he was _human_ now, as human as any other human. He was entitled to his dignity.

What an anti-climax!

From shapeshifting, dying half a dozen times, facing dreaded assassins to going back to his empty flat, alone. He wanted to call John but his water-soaked phone needed repairs first.

“Can I help you sir?”

Sherlock looked at the concierge. “Can you sneak me back into that flat?”

“I think you better leave the premises mister.”

Grumbling at how unfriendly and unhelpful people had become, Sherlock started to walk back to his flat. He could hire a cab from the main road but he needed that exercise, he needed the cool, fresh air of the early AM hours. It would clear his brain and help with that erection.

When he reached 221B, he had a strange feeling someone was inside. But who? Another assassin? One of Mycroft’s spies? A bot installed by the cheeky Jim to scare the shit out of him?

He carefully tiptoed into the flat and stopped. The faint whiff of that cologne, those yet-to-be-unpacked bags, the familiar sight of things put away in their places and tea brewing in a pot in the kitchen. Then those familiar footsteps coming down the hallway from the bedroom.

“JAWN!!!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last chapter has some hot JohnLock to compensate for John being MIA for most of the story


	13. Home and Human again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> JohnLock hotness as they reunite. A bit of a feline angle here. Mostly PWP.

John had returned home to an empty flat. After spending almost an entire days at the airport, trying his best to get a confirmed ticket back to England, he felt glad to be back to the familiar sights and sounds of ‘home’ but it didn’t quite feel the same without Sherlock in it. He had expected the detective to be conducting some weird experiment, sitting stone-like on his chair and thinking, furiously typing away on his laptop and trolling a troll or better still, in bed and sprawled out like butter over sandwich bread, waiting for John to eat him out.

“What am I thinking?” He reproached himself gently, “I should just hope he’s fine, especially after that phone call he made…..”

Talking to himself, he began to clean up the flat almost by habit. He had often complained that living with Sherlock was like living with a group of naughty and restless kids, their flat mostly looked like a hurricane had run through it. Naturally, as the caregiver and nurturer, he had begun to clean up whenever he saw a little mess rather than wait for the entire place to look like a battlefield before starting to tidy it up. He picked things up and put them in their places, started the kettle in the kitchen so he could have some tea before going to bed, opened the windows to let some fresh air in and the stale air out, then went to the bathroom to freshen up. He saw a note taped to the mirror over the bathroom sink. ‘ _Do not remove the kangaroo balls I have kept in the fridge – SH’_.

“Typical Sherlock,” John shook his head in amusement.

While he was just finishing in the bathroom, suddenly he heard the door downstairs open with that familiar creak. Then he heard footsteps coming up. Then the door of their flat opened.

John rushed out of the bathroom in his pajamas, went to the bedroom to drop the sweaty clothes he had been wearing all day into the laundry basket, then went straight to the living room to check.

Before he even reached there, he had an armful of Sherlock who cried out ‘Jawn!’

That cry! John had never heard that tone before from Sherlock! It was filled with several emotions at once. Delight, relief, thrill, excitement, hope, it was brimming with a plethora of feelings and sensations. As John hugged Sherlock back, those feelings infectiously transferred on to him and he felt exhilarated. “Hey baby,” he said, caressing Sherlock’s back as the man comically clung to him like a monkey, long arms and legs wrapped around him in a tight clasp.

“I am so-so-so glad to see you!”

“Me too love. You okay?”

“Yeah, better, now that you’re here.”

“Wow!” John smiled broadly, “You’ve never said that before. You really sure you’re okay? Is that case done and dusted?”

“Yeah,” Sherlock replied, burying his face in John’s neck and kissing the skin there, “Done. I’m good, really, but I’ll be better if you just give me some deep-tissue massage right now.”

John’s eyes widened slightly with disbelief. Sherlock had often demanded sex before, but he had never been _this_ horny and _this_ desperate. He could feel the man’s erection, wet spots on the trouser, he could smell the arousal and hormones on him, feel the tremors running through his body! Sherlock was shaking with the need for some skin-on-skin contact. It excited John too, made him dizzy with arousal and before he knew it he had picked up the taller man as if he weighed nothing and carried him to the bedroom. He tossed him down on the bed, aware that Sherlock needed more rough-handling at this moment rather than gentle, sweet loving, and started to shed his own clothes.

Sherlock watched him greedily, fumbling with his own clothes in the meantime. He had only got out of his shirt by the time a completely naked John jumped into bed with him. “What are these things you’re wearing love?” He noticed for the first time that Sherlock was literally floating in his clothes which were two sizes bigger, at least, “These are not your clothes? Who did you borrow them from, pumpkin?”

“I-I lost mine when-when….”

“It’s okay, tell me later….”

“Uhnnnnn……JAWN!”

John had delved down to suck on his cock!!!

Sherlock thrashed about on the bed, beside himself with arousal and clawing at the sheets around him. John’s chestnut and sandy brown head between his legs, bobbing up and down, those rough pads of the doctor’s fingers sensuously teasing the sensitive inner skin of his thighs, the hard smooth palms cradling his balls and rolling them, how was he going to survive this sweet assault for more than a minute. He could already feel an orgasm coming up!

“J-Jawn….it’s coming!” He rasped out, hips stuttering and spasming.

John looked up through his lashes and bangs and released his hold over Sherlock’s hips. He also relaxed his throat and kept his head steady.

“Oh-Ohhh…..” Sherlock went as he started to move his hips, fucking John’s mouth. The wicked tongue kept doing things to him that further pushed his libido and before Sherlock knew it he felt a familiar jerk at his navel and a corresponding tightening of his balls. He moaned out, loud.

Then he exploded.

John sucked him hard, drinking down everything he had to offer. Sherlock created quite the racket as he went into ecstasy and slowly came down from it, before his noises tapered down into small and delightful little whines. It was music to the doctor’s ears and he kept caressing every part of his Sherlock as he fellated him, calming him down with the soothing touches. Almost a minute later, John gave his wet cock a last peck on the tip and said, “You taste like whole milk.”

That’s because I drank a lot of milk in the past few days! Sherlock realized he wanted to tell John the whole tale of his week-long feline experience. With a small sigh, he snuggled into John’s arms, hid his face in the man’s chest and started to narrate his story. The more John listened, the tauter he became with concentration, anxiety and finally, tension. It was only after Sherlock had concluded his retelling of all the courses of each and every event, leading right up to the point where he was evicted from Jim and Seb’s house, that John Watson relaxed somewhat and even began to giggle. That offended Sherlock who looked up at him with a frown, “Hey, that’s not very proper.”

“Since when have you been a man for ‘properness’ my pumpkin?”

“But why laugh at me?”

“Mostly laughing at a weird coincidence.”

“Like what?”

“Cat ears, tail, paws, cat suit, that you just spoke about as a secret wish for some bed games?”

“Y-Yeah?”

“I actually got the whole kit from an ‘adult-items’ store close to the hotel I was staying in. Somehow I read your mind….or should I say, the naughty kinks your heart desires?”

Sherlock’s lips curved into a beaming smile and he clutched at John with both hands, “No shit! You’re not kidding me, right? You really have those cat things with you? You want that too?”

“Yes, they were supposed to be an anniversary gift anyways….a gift for both of us, since this week marks the time when we first got together as a couple and I saw you shape shift from a furry feline to a sexy young lad….okay, okay, don’t sulk, I mean a sexy young man!”

A yelp left John as Sherlock grabbed his cock with both hands and began to tug and pull at it, eager to please his man. “Sorry,” he said playfully as he licked at John’s sensitive nipples, “I know you have an urge too. Shouldn’t have neglected that!”

In half a minute John was a groaning mess, spilling all over himself, Sherlock’s fingers and the sheets. The intensity with which he came was spectacular and Sherlock almost had a mini-orgasm from watching him. “Better now?” He asked, collapsing next to a panting John.

“Best,” John mumbled, eyes closing in bliss, “You’re the best!”

***

“Sherlock, where are you?” John called out and his voice made the detective, who was in the bedroom and waiting for him (per their agreement earlier), shiver from anticipating. At the outset he seemed to be simply looking for his partner but the growling undertone gave away the real passion lurking beneath. John was going to ravish him that evening and through the night, make him cum so often he would forget his own name. That was the agreement, that was the promise, and Sherlock could barely wait to savor the moments when the promise would be converted into a real experience.

“In heeeere!” He called out in as playful a voice as he could manage.

Footsteps approached the room and John walked in, stopping at the doorway when he saw Sherlock in his ‘special’ attire and accessories. He was wearing a striped jockstrap made of leather, with some fuzz on it resembling cat fur, and it had a tail clipped behind with a heart at the tip. He also wore cat ears and a snout, plus a tag hanging around his neck which said ‘Sex-Kitten’ in bold letters. The tag was made of dark chocolate and the letters were in white chocolate, making for an interesting contrast. Sherlock seemed fully prepared, not just with the accessories he wore but also his erection, that was now slapping against his flat belly.

John began to palm himself over his pants.

“Don’t do that,” Sherlock said.

“You dare challenge your owner?” John thundered.

“Sorry Captain,” Sherlock said in a small voice, “Come here and fuck me.”

“You forgot to say _please_!”

“Please, pretty-pretty _please_!”

“That’s better!!”

John shed off his clothes, then did a facepalm! _Forgot something_! He went to the living room to ensure the door was bolted from inside, then rushed back into the bedroom. He found Sherlock lying upside down and grinding himself on the sheets. “Did I say you could do that?” He growled, putting his hands on his hips. He realized his erect dick was pointing straight at Sherlock but he controlled his bubbling laughter, no matter how utterly comical he found that moment to be!

“No,” Sherlock sat up, “I am at your service sir!”

“You’re such a _sexy private_ ,” John had mixed up the role play, as had Sherlock, and their original _cat_ and _cat-owner_ avatars had mingled with their ‘captain and private, military boy avatars’. But neither of them cared, not when there was an enormous opportunity to have the most amazing sex ever! John joined Sherlock in bed and they kissed, stubbles rasping, mouths clashing, teeth knocking together, tongue rubbing against each other and saliva being swapped. John often wondered how Sherlock managed to go from the cold, calculating, loudmouth genius detective to this sexy, saucepot of a creature that could put anyone’s sainthood at stake. Maybe that was because Sherlock always gave it his best shot at everything he did. If he kissed, he put his heart, soul _and dick_ into the kiss.

John chuckled. Sherlock’s dick was leaking like a faucet, the clear slick flooding John’s palm as the younger man shamelessly rubbed himself against John’s palm and fingers, fucking his fist. “Nah,” John withdrew his touch, “Not like this, private. I have a different plan for you!”

“Y-Yes sir.”

“Lie down, on your back.”

“Oh-Ohkay.”

“Now coat your fingers with this lube.”

“Done Captain.”

“Now start preparing yourself. But don’t you dare touch your cock. Or I shall……”

“No-No, I won’t, I won’t!”

Sherlock felt his fingers sink in and moaned, closing his eyes. He though John was going to just watch him (and being watched by John felt like a touch in itself and he already had goosebumps rising on his flesh), but the doctor started to mouth the head of his cock and drag the chocolate tag over his chest sensuously, making him moan, thrash his head around, buck up into that hot mouth and then push down on his own fingers. His head felt light and fuzzy, his entire body had heated up to the temperature of his loins and loud, whorish moans tumbled out of his mouth.

The chocolate started to melt on his skin.

“Don’t move,” John ordered, “Keep them fingers in, hold still.”

“Yes….”

“That would be ‘YES SIR’, understood?”

“YES SIR…….OHHHHHH!!!” Sherlock hollered as John began to lick off the melted chocolate from his skin, lavishing special attention to his nipples. He wrapped a hand around Sherlock’s cock and groaned with satisfaction when, with every flick of his nipple on a sensitive nub, he felt Sherlock’s rock-hard cock throb in his fist. John stiffened his legs to control the spontaneous orgasm that almost threatened to spill out from his aching manhood. Sherlock’s responsiveness and fluid sensuality was sweet torture to him and keeping himself in check was the biggest problem for him right now.

“Enough,” he said, “I’ll replace those fingers with something bigger this time. On all fours my favorite kitty.”

Sherlock gladly obeyed.

Coating himself liberally with lube, John got on his knees behind Sherlock and slowly breached him, sinking in inch by inch till he was so deep inside his balls slapped the curve of Sherlock’s smooth bubble butt. “Yes,” John smacked at them and enjoyed the imprint of his hands on the rosy and spotless skin of his lover’s butt, “That’s how I like my cat. I hold him by the tail and watch his ears bob as I fuck him so hard he can feel me right up to his throat.”

“Oh yeaaah,” Sherlock moaned as John began to ride him, his long arm reaching behind himself to grab John’s hip and pushing him in deeper, “Yes Captain, punish me, fuck me hard, brand me, own me, make me remember you for a week to come!”

“Slut!”

“Ohhhh!”

“Yes, yes, yes, fuck, here it comes!”

“Jawwnnnn!”

Both men stiffened and shuddered, then still completely as they came. John flowed into Sherlock, panting hard as he felt his strength drain. Sherlock came without a touch, a completely hands-free orgasm that happened from the hard stimulation to his sweet spot. They came and came and came, the bed creaking loudly, the things on the nightstand shaking, and John was glad they had bought a bigger, sturdier bed since the last time they broke their…..

THUMP! “Owwww!” “Ouch!”

“You okay pumpkin?” John asked, slipping out of his ‘role’ since his concern for Sherlock’s wellbeing always overrode everything else. Sherlock looked so cute, ravished and deflowered, still wearing his ‘cat’ accessories.

“Yeah,” Sherlock said, trying to regain his bearings and leaning gladly against is _strong, solid as a rock_ John, “But we need to buy another bed Jawn, once again!”

***

A week later Mycroft and Greg Lestrade got married at a quiet, private ceremony at a chapel close to the Holmes family’s stately mansion in the English countryside. Attended only by close friends, family and longstanding business associates, the larger crowd and cocktails, live band and noisy party was left for the evening reception at a nearby boutique hotel. Sherlock was appalled to see _James Moriarty_ selected as Mycroft’s best man but his anger dissipated when he found Greg had chosen him to be _his_ best man. So that explained why Mycroft had do go for the _next choice_! The two former nemesis and current ‘frenemies’ gave each other pointed looks as the ceremony was officiated by a priest who happened to be a close friend of Papa Holmes.

“Don’t scratch yourself like that,” Jim whispered as the vows were exchanged. Sherlock scowled initially but went ‘Oh’ when he saw he was actually scratching his neck like a feline would. “Sorry some habits take some time to…um…go….” he whispered back. Jim winked and grinned.

Later that night, there was a loud shout from the honeymoon suite of the hotel where the newlyweds were staying. Jim and Sebastian and John and Sherlock, who had been provided suites on the same floor, came rushing out to check what was going on. When Sebastian easily unlocked the door using a pointy candy cane (Jim had sucked it into that odd shape), they found Mycroft reasoning with a ‘cat’, saying _‘We can discuss this later, you have to go now, even mummy won’t approve of this’_ while Greg cowered in the corner of the room wearing a sheet. “Sherlock?” He startled, “How are you here?”

“What do you mean?” Sherlock fired back, “Just like John, Seb and Jim, I came here on my legs.”

“No, I mean….isn’t that you?” Greg pointed at the tabby cat, grey and white stripes all over, green eyes and long whiskers.

“Obviously not,” John butted in, “He was with me all through.”

“Since this isn’t _Sherlock_ ,” Jim went and picked up the cat in his arms, “We’ll just throw it out of the window.”

“Hey-Hey-Jimmy-Waiiit,” Sebastian shouted while the rest gasped. He took the cat away from Jim and stomped out of the room, closely followed by Jim who kept arguing _‘But Sherlock said no matter how high up a cat is thrown from, they always land on their feet’_.

“Well, what are you looking at?” Mycroft said coldly to Sherlock, then added with his usual sarcasm, “I don’t believe anyone in the right frame of mind is interested in the sex-life of their brother.”

Sherlock had opened his mouth to bicker when John forcefully dragged him away. Once out of that room he asked, “But I remember you were ginger colored with white paws and ears. How exactly can he mistake a striped cat for you?”

“Um….there was a bit of a deviation this time,” Sherlock explained, still throwing dirty glances in the direction of Mycroft and Greg’s suite, “When I became a feline this time I was milk and ash….I mean I was wholly white save for little patches around my head and paws of very mild ash color. It’s complicated you see, my elder brother isn’t experienced with wedding nights as he is with negotiating peace treaties and immunity for masterminds. He’s tense and Greg is anxious, naturally, any feline that gets into their vicinity is mistaken for Sherlock…..whoa, what’s gotten into you?”

John dragged him into their room, grinning lasciviously from ear to ear. “I got the cat tail, ears and furry jock strap. What say we have a bit of ‘catty-sex’ tonight?”

“What’s with you Jawn,” Sherlock stood like a princess as John began to disrobe him, “Forgot the great detective Sherlock Holmes, settled for a slutty cat instead!”

“What can I do Sherlock?” John led the completely nude man to bed, dropping his pants on the way, “There is a bit of an animal lover in all of us!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks fore the hits, kudos, comments and interest in this story. The last chapter was completely 'Not-Needed' but I think I owed you all some JohnLock smoking hot sex, after depriving you of John's presence in most of the story! Cheers!


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